Among the Maoris; or, Daybreak in New Zealand. A record of the labours of Samuel Marsden, Bishop Selwyn and others

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AMONG THE MAORIS

2)a^l)rcak in 1Rcw Zcalanb

A RECORD OF THE LABOURS OF SAMUEL MARSDEN,
BISHOP SELIVYN, AND OTHERS

BY

JESSE PAGE

AUTHOR OF "amid GREENLAND SNOWS ; ' " HENRY MARTYN," ETC.

Another record of what Christ can do,
The miracle of grace in heathen lands,

How faithhil witnesses to duty true,

Went forth for Him, their lives within their hands.

Counting His smile their gain, all else but loss.

So they might point poor sinners to the Cross.

FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY
New York Chicago Toronto

Publishers of Evangelical Literature.

f3

7 9994"

PREFACE.

WHEN Macaulay depicted the New Zealander
some day sitting on the ruins of London
Bridge, to meditate upon the mouldering
reHcs of St. Paul's, he clearly anticipated
for that intelligent native a future he was never to
see. For the Maori race is a fast vanishing quantity,
and long before old age sets in upon the Thames,
the tattooed original of New Zealand will have
become as rare as the dodo.

To many, this rapid declension of a fine race will be
a source of regret ; to still more it will bring keener
disappointment to remember that its extinction, which
some think inevitable, has been hastened by a policy
hardly creditable to the English people. In taking
up any historical thread in the past of New Zealand,
it is extremely difficult to avoid an extended refer-
ence to the political situation, and those movements
of arms and diplomacy which have been inextricably

vi PREFACE.

woven with the religious question. Throughout
the story of the Maori war, the wild patriotism of
the native Royalists, the flicker of their temporary
success against the English, the final crash and dark-
ness of their subjugation, and their subsequent retreat
and demoralisation — all this has been told, and is,
indeed, a recital of vivid and pathetic interest.

But the purpose of this present work is with the
religious aspect of New Zealand almost exclusively,
and to reproduce from a past of less than a century,
some scenes of early labour for Christ, and the
labourers themselves. Amongst these, two figures
stand out in bold relief — Samuel Marsden, the
pioneer missionary, and George Augustus Selwyn,
the first Bishop.

It is surprising how little is said about Marsden
in the plentiful mention of missionaries now-a-days.
Such a man ought not to be forgotten. To him
we owe the establishment of Christianity in New
Zealand ; indeed, to his wisdom and work are we
indebted for the colony itself. A study of his
character will easily show that he was not a man
to become very popular. He had the ungenteel
faculty of calling a spade a spade, and denounced,
like all the prophets do in every age, the wickedness
of worldliness. Like Henry Martyn in India, so
Samuel Marsden in Sydney soon found his foes were
of his own household, and that officialism, lay and
cleric, was affronted by the faithful rebukes of an
uncompromising zeal. This man was no trimmer ;
he had not learnt those arts of worldly-wise navi-
gation which sails between loyalty to God and com-
munion with the devil. He made enemies, and

PREFACE. VI 1

one can only regret that he spent so much time and
money in defending his character in the courts.
In common with all pioneer missionaries he trusted
the natives, and stood up manfully for their just
rights in the face of his own countrymen. Selwyn,
who followed him, took up the same honourable
line of conduct. There was a massive simplicity
about the character of Marsden ; he believed in God
and the Bible, and found the grand old evangelical
doctrines of Christianity quite enough for his work
in preaching salvation to sinners. One cannot help
loving him for his humility, as evidenced on one
occasion when discovering, in the memoirs of his
friend, Dr. Mason Good, some pages speaking highly
of his own work at Paramatta : he would not allow
it to be read in his house until he had cut out the
portion devoted to his own praise.

He sowed the seed in the yet untilled ground, and
lived to see much fruit in the conversion of the
natives ; and with his catholic spirit he rejoiced
that not only Churchmen but Christians of other
communions were also reaping the benefit of his
toil.

Of Bishop Selwyn there is not need for many words ;
not that he was not worthy, but because he belongs
to our own time, and the story of his noble and
apostolic ministry is still fresh in the annals of his
Church and country. Those who have studied the
life of Bishop Patteson wall not be surprised that
he and Selwyn should have been such close and
sympathetic friends. The work of the first Bishop
of New Zealand remains to this day in a thriving
and earnest Colonial Church, and ministers, who

Vlll PREFACE.

arc stimulated by his example to conceive a high
estimate of their responsibihty to God and man.

It only remains for me to express my obligations
to the Church Missionary Society for again giving
me every assistance in the preparation for this work,
and to mention, for the guidance of any who would
like to pursue the subject more fully, the following
volumes as reference works, viz. : — " Memoirs of
Rev, Samuel Marsden," edited by Rev. J. B. Mars-
den (Religious Tract Society) ; " The Story of New
Zealand," by Dr. A. S. Thomson (John Murray) ;
" Christianity among the New Zealanders," by the
Bishop of Waiapu (Seeley) ; " Life of Bishop
Selwyn," by Rev. W. H. Tucker (Seeley) ; " New
Zealand," by William Gisborne (Petherick) ; " New
Zealand, Past and Present," by Rev. Richard Taylor
(Macintosh) ; " The Maori King," by J. E. Gorst
(Macmillan) ; " Maori," by Captain Johnston (Chap-
man & Hall) ; " Nation Making," by J. C. Firth
(Longman); "Our Last Year in New Zealand,"
by Bishop Cowie (Kegan Paul) ; Yate's " New
Zealand " (Seeley) ; and " Conquests of the Cross "
(Cassell).

And now, gentle reader, let me ope the door of
my book and introduce you to two good men and
true, from whose company, I trust, you may receive
the same stimulus, profit, and pleasure which have
been vouchsafed to me.

TESSE PAGE.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

PAGE

DISCOVERY AND EARLY HISTORY, II

CHAPTER II.

MARSDEN GOES FORTH, 2$

CHAPTER III.

DUATERRA AND OTHERS, 35

CHAPTER IV.

"WOUNDED IN THE HOUSE OF HIS FRIENDS," . • 45

CHAPTER V.

THE CROSS EXCHANGED FOR THE CROWN, ... 65

CHAPTER VI.

THE SUPERSTITIONS AND WORSHIP OF THE MAORIS, . 77

ix

I'AfiE
90

X CONTENTS.

CHAPTER VII.

SOME OF THE SHEAVES,

CHAPTER VIII.

SELWYN, THE FIRST BISHOP, 1 05

CHAPTER' IX.

THE PEACEMAKER, I16

CHAPTER X.

THE HAU-HAU APOSTASY, .

CHAPTER XI.

THE MAORIS .\T HOME,

CHAPTER XII.

THE WORK IN RECENT TIIMES, .

127

140

"N --^',1

y

AMONG THE MAORIS.

CHAPTER I.

DISCOVERY AND EARLY HISTORY.

" I heard the voice of Jesus say,
I am this dark world's light ;
Look unto Me ; thy morn shall rise,
And all thy day be bright."

IX the olden days, when stately Spanish galleons
sailed the sea, a Dutch admiral, Tasman by
name, first sighted from the deck of his good
ship Heanskirk the land about which these pages
tell. He had sailed from Batavia with two ships on
a voyage of discovery, and on the i8th of September,
1642, cast his anchor in a quiet bay not far from
where the beautiful and prosperous city of Nelson
now stands. Although some have claimed for Juan
Fernandez and Magellan the credit of the discovery,
there is now little doubt about that honour being
rightly attributed to the Dutchman, whose name is

II

12 AMONG THE MAORIS.

Still associated witli the country under the title of
Tasmania. He looked eagerly for signs of human
beings, and presently saw two canoes leaving the
shores for his ships. As they drew near he noticed
their manly physique, and one of the party hailed
him with discordant sounds from a huge trumpet.
Nothing, however, could overcome the timidity of
these savages ; every effort to barter was useless.
But, finally, by dint of much persuasion, two or three
of the natives climbed the side of the Heemskirk with
fear and trembling. The Dutchmen, scarcely less
distrustful of the consequences, warned their fellows
of danger, and quickly a panic ensued ; the boat pass-
ing between the ships was attacked by the canoes,
and three men were dispatched by their tomahawks.
Fearing further mischief, Tasman weighed anchor and
prepared to sail away, when twenty-two canoes came
towards the vessels, whether with hostile intentions
it is difficult to say, but they were promptly met with
a broadside which killed some of the men and
frightened the others into hasty retreat. Significantly
naming the place Massacre Bay, the discoverer passed
round the North Cape, which he called Maria van
Dieman, where again he attempted to land ; there,
however, he saw, or thought he saw, natives of
immense size striding along the shore with big clubs
in their hands, so with a terrible story to tell, he
steered his ships back to the Indies.

Australia had already been discovered by De
Ouiros, who gave it the fanciful name of Ouira
Australis del Espirita Santo, or the Southern Land
of the Holy Spirit, and Tasman did not know that
the land to which he gave his name was an island,
but concluded it must be a part of the mainland of
Australia.

DISCOVERY AND EARLY HISTORY

I^.

Nothing seems to have been heard of the newly
discovered country until our own Captain Cook in
the year 1769, nearly a century later, reached the
place, and was the first European to set his foot upon
its shores. He had been commissioned to voyage
in the Southern Hemisphere to make special observa-
tions of the transit of Venus over the sun ; but his
love of discovery led him to pay more attention to

CAPTAIN COOK.

terrestrial than celestial matters. He was not
impressed, however, with the appearance of the land
upon which for the first time he stood, and called it
Poverty Bay ; but passing afterwards among the
islands of the Western Cape, he managed to get into
familiar intercourse with the natives, and discovered
the beauty and value of their country.

He seems to have acted with needless severity in

14 AMONG THE MAORIS.

punishini^ these poor, ignorant people for their mis-
deeds, and much bloodshed followed upon his high-
handed treatment of natives caught pilfering, or
otherwise making themselves offensive to the white
men. One instance will suffice. Lieutenant Gore
fired from the ship's deck at a New Zcalandcr in his
canoe who had defrauded him of a piece of calico.
In the excitement of paddling to escape the injury
done by the musket, it was not noticed by the
natives in the canoe, although detected by Mr. Gore
from the ship's deck, that Maru-tu-ahu (the man shot)
had scarcely altered his position. When the canoe
reached the shore the natives found their comrade
sitting dead on the stolen calico, which was stained
with his life's blood, the ball having entered his back.
Several chiefs investigated the affair, and declared
Maru-tu-ahu deserved his fate, that he stole, and was
killed for so doing, and that his life-blood should not
be avenged on the strangers. Seeing, however, that
Maru-tu-ahu paid for the calico with his life, it was not
taken away from him, but was wrapped round his
body as a winding-sheet. Singular to relate. Captain
Cook landed soon after the murder, and traded as
if nothing had happened. The question naturally
arises : Would Cook's crew have acted in the
magnanimous spirit which these natives had evinced
if one of their number had been as ruthlessly killed ?
When he left he had not lost a single man at the
hands of these wild men ; he had traded with them
very successfully, and had introduced to them pork
and potatoes as articles of food.

As his vessel. The Endeavour, passed away, a
"French ship arrived in Doubtless Bay, with De Sur-
ville and a large crew. The natives received them
with kindly welcome, and during a violent storm

DISCOVERY AND EARLY HISTORY. 1 5

cared for their sick in a village on shore. A suspicion
however fell upon one of the chiefs as to the theft of
a boat, he was enticed on board, put in irons, and
died of a broken heart eight days afterwards. In
common with all savage races, the spirit of retaliation
was strong in the natives, and, greatly incensed at the
cruel injustice of De Surville, they waited their time
for taking revenge. The opportunity did not arise
for three years, when another French discoverer,
Marion du Fresne by name, reached the Bay of
Islands, and was delighted with the apparent friendli-
ness of the people. The strangers were soon ashore,
and lived a free and careless life in the villages.
One day, when Marion returned to his ship, the
natives decorated his head with four white feathers,
much to his gratification. Two days afterwards, he
and sixteen officers went with a friendly chief on a
fishing expedition, and were never seen again. A
survivor related how the whole party, with the excep-
tion of himself, had been killed and eaten. A terrible
attack upon the natives was the consequence —
hundreds were slaughtered, and those found walking
about in the dresses of the murdered sailors, were
specially marked for death. Crozel, the second in
command of the French boat, who led the expedition
away from such dreadful associations, called the place,
" ' The Bay of Treachery,' for," said he, " they treated
us with every show of friendship for thirty-three days,
with the intention of eating us on the thirty-fourth."

Many years afterwards, however, quite another
version of the affair was gathered from the conversa-
tion of some old New Zealanders round a fire. Says
the narrator : " I awoke one night, and hearing the
name of Marion mentioned, I pretended to sleep, and
listened to the conversation. From many words, I

l6 AMONG THE MAORIS.

gathered that, long ago, two vessels commanded by
Marion visited the Bay of Islands, and that a strong
friendship sprang up between both races, and that
they planted the garlic which flavours the milk,
butter, and flesh of cows fed in that district. Before
the Wewis, as the French are now called, departed,
they violated the sacred places, cooked food with
tapued (sacred) wood and put the chiefs in irons ;
that, in revenge, their ancestors killed Marion and
several of his crew, and in the same spirit the French
burned villages and shot many New Zealanders."

On Captain Cook's return to New Zealand in 1774,
other collisions with the natives followed, and when
the news reached Europe of the savagery and canni-
balism of the newly discovered country, its people
became a byword of horror. Benjamin Franklin
urged that a ship should be sent filled with useful
articles to barter with them, but this object could not
be accomplished, for even sailors sick with scurvy or
dying of thirst could not be persuaded to approach a
coast where such a dreadful people dwelt.

When Admiral D'Entrecasteaux visited the coast
in 1793, he was so terrified at the prospect of meeting
with the natives, that he would not permit a naturalist
who was on board to secure some specimens of the
flax, which, from the mats already taken to Europe,
was proved to be of such fine quality. What, how-
ever, the French were too fearful to obtain, the English
in the same year found a method of securing. A
colony had been formed in Norfolk Island in 1789,
and the settlers were delighted to see the flax plant
growing luxuriantly, but they found it impossible to
weave the material with the same ingenuity as shown
in the New Zealand mats. So they kidnapped two
of the natives from the coast, but found to their dis-

DISCOVERY AND EARLY HISTORY.

17

may that one was a chief and the other a priest ;
neither professed to know anything about the
weaving, which they contemptuously described as
"woman's work." They were consequently sent
back to their homes loaded with presents, the most
valuable of these being some pigs and maize, and, as
a result, the natives treated Captain King, the
governor of Norfolk Island, and his men with

SCENE OF THE " BOYU " MASSACRE.

great hospitality. After this the prejudice against
the New Zealanders began to abate, and many
fishermen visiting Cook's Strait, Queen Charlotte
Sound, Dusky Bay, Mount Cook, and other haunts
of the whale, made acquaintance with the people
on shore, and even left their ships, to settle down
permanently with the natives. One of these, a
sailor youth named Bruce, suffered himself to be
tattooed, and married the daughter of a chief, but

1 8 AMONG THE MAORIS.

through the unscrupulous conduct of his own country-
men, he came to a melancholy end.

A strong desire to know something of the
land from which the white men came, tempted
several New Zealanders to visit England. A chief
named Mohanger came in 1805, Matara in 1807,
and Ruatera in 1809; the latter was a very
intelligent man, who afterwards became a useful
worker with the missionaries, and was one of the first
fruits of Christianity in New Zealand. But in 1809,
just as confidence was beginning to be established, it
received a severe shock by the tidings of the massacre
of the crew and passengers of the Boyd. She had on
board the son of a Wangaroa chief named Tarra, and
because he was ill and could not work, the captain
treated him with brutal severity, and twice flogged
him at the gangway. He bore the injury in silence,
but when once ashore he hastened to his tribe and
showed them his scarified back while he recounted
his wrongs. The revenge was awful ; the whole of
the crew were allowed on shore and then killed and
eaten, one boy alone being spared who had shown to
Tarra some trifling kindness when in his sufferings.
This shocking conduct was in turn speedily avenged,
unhappily not upon the guilty but upon an unoffend-
ing people who had been no party to the massacre.
Five whaling ships landed armed men in the Bay of
Islands, burnt a large native village to the ground,
killing every human being, young or old, including
the friendly chief Te Pahi, who had hitherto been
very kind to the English.

This terrible occurrence awakened a strong feeling
of animosity in Europe against the New Zealanders,
and the traders openly employed any means, fair or
foul, for their destruction. It became war to the

DISCOVERY AND EARLY HISTORY. 1 9

knife on either side ; every vessel nearing the coast
shot down Hke partridges the natives who clustered
on the beach, and in return ship after ship wrecked
on the shore had its crew murdered and eaten.

How long this disastrous spirit would have continued
it is impossible to say, but a change was brought about
in the situation by the introduction of gunpowder and
firearms to the natives. A distinguished and brave
New Zealand chief in 1820, Hongi by name, came
with a missionary to England and was of great assist-
ance in compiling the first grammar of his language.
George IV. gave him audience and many presents,
and, filled with exciting stories of Napoleon's battles
and the military prestige and weapons of the English,
he returned to his native country, nominally a Christ-
ian, and rich in gifts. On landing at Sydney he
heard of the death of his son-in-law in a tribal fight,
and this completely changed him. Consumed with
grief and a desire to avenge his death he sold off all
his presents to buy 300 European muskets, and fitting
out a fleet of canoes he made war upon the offending
tribe. The use of firearms gave him a speedy victory,
slaughter and cruelty abounded, as he laid waste the
country, and when he returned to the Bay of Islands
it was with a host of slaves. His enemies now saw
that at any cost they also must obtain the deadly
weapons of the white man, and in his subsequent
battles Hongi soon found it necessary to wear a suit
of steel armour which had been given him by the
English king. But a bullet found him at length, and
he lingered long, mortally wounded. At last, decked
out in his war array, grasping the instruments of
destruction which had stood him in such good stead,
Hongi died in his tent, urging his followers, however,
not to harm the missionaries, " for " said he, " they

20 AMONG THE MAORIS.

have done good, and not done harm." Thus died a
man who was the Napoleon of New Zealand, save
that his genius for bloodshed was directed against
his own countrymen. He also had many estimable
qualities, a high sense of honour and a tender heart,
and no insult would provoke him to take the life of a
European. But when on the war-path and his savage
nature was inflamed, he displayed that utmost dis-
regard for human life which characterises the Maori,

In due time the natives and Europeans were brought
in closer contact com.mercially, the former being
anxious to possess firearms, the latter ready to take
advantage of their willingness to barter. The
natives became anxious to possess European com-
modities. The introduction of tobacco had made a
brisk trade in the weed, and the height of ambition
in the New Zealand mind was to walk about with a
pipe and to dress himself in the second-hand calico
garments of the white man. Contact with Euro-
peans, and those of a very inferior order, soon began
to tell upon the native character, and their simple
confidence in the traders having so often been betrayed,
they conspired with equal treachery to outdo their
unprincipled visitors.

But the most fearful result of the new order of
warfare was the increase of tribal bloodshed. The
example of Hongi was soon repeated, and masses of
natives were involved in bitter and cruel strife. They
had firearms now to supplement their savage weapons
and tactics, and in some cases the white men were ready
to offer their services. The most terrible conflict was
that between Te-Whero-Whero, chief of the Waikato
nation, and Pomare and Kawiti, leaders of the
Ngapuhi warriors, in which no quarter was given,
and even prisoners were all killed after the battles.

DISCOVERY AND EARLY HISTORY. 23

Such disastrous fights could not long continue ; the
bullet had soon filled the land with limping sufferers
who had survived, and as the use of firearms became
more common the people began to hesitate before
they entered upon a struggle which so exhausted
both victor and vanquished.

About this time there was a class of men mixing
with the Maoris (a name signifying " native "), known
as Pakeha Maoris, a term which meant "strangers
turned into natives." These were Europeans, mostly
whalers, who had voluntarily left their ships and
settled down into savage life, suffering the painful
ordeal of the tattoo, and in all respects living as the
natives. For some years the aborigines treated these
visitors with scant respect, seeing that they came
amongst them for selfish motives only, the Maoris
compelling them to become their slaves. So hard
was their lot under this bondage, that several of them,
who were convicts, and who had escaped into the bush
from Botany Bay, were glad to escape and ask for
their chains again, after such a life with the natives.
In the course of a few years it was found that these
Pakeha Maoris would be serviceable in their trading
with the settlers, and some who took advantage of this
to make themselves of great importance rose to the
position of chiefs. They in turn tyrannised over
their captors, and held high revel with whisky and
scores of retainers as kings among savages.

Again, however, the tide of popularity left them
when at Auckland, Wellington, and Taranaki, the
natives found out that they could trade better direct
with the white men, who were evidently of a class far
superior to these Pakeha Maoris. Henceforth these
degraded men, who had renounced all the decencies
of civilisation, to say nothing of Christianity, became

24 AMONG THE MAORIS.

an unemployed and vagrant class, and gradually died
out. In 1840 every tribe had its white savage, but
from 150 the number fell to 10 in 1853, and while,
of course, half castes abound to-day, not one of the
original Pakeha Maoris exists. Travellers passing far
inland up the Wangani river have found an old copy
of Shakespeare, a classical dictionar)-, and by a grave
on the Mokau river was picked up a tattered and
stained English prayer-book. As these men preceded
the missionary in the island, it may be asked how far
they influenced the natives for good. Their self-
imposed savagery had, of course, a brutalising effect
on themselves, but it is only fair to record that in
many cases they taught the natives to trust the white
men and cultivate the employments of industry and
peace instead of preying on each other in tribal wars.

But before the Gospel had come to New Zealand,
in the darkness of heathen night the people uncon-
sciously waited the rising of a better dawn. An eye-
witness, speaking of such a time, says : " We cannot
well picture to ourselves a race of men more savage
and debased, more strongly bound with an age-
riveted chain than they were. Killing was literally
no murder, and man regarded his fellowman as his
proper food, which he was justified in using whenever
it could be procured. Hence wars never ceased ;
murders, rapine, and wrong were of constant occur-
rence. And this was not only the case with tribes,
but even with families."

Surely if ever a nation needed Christ it was this
people, and the time drew near when the great Master
of the vineyard of this world would call one of His
servants to go forth thither and sow the seed of His
kingdom.

^M-

^■-

^^^txS^- ■^^--v^

CHAPTER II.

MARSDEN GOES FORTH,

" Speed Thy servants, Saviour, speed them !

Thou art Lord of winds and waves ;
They were bound, but Thou hast freed them ;

Now they go to free the slaves ;
Be Thou with them ! Be Thou with them 1

'Tis Thine arm alone that saves I"

THE man who was the pioneer of Christianity to
the Maoris was the son of a blacksmith. He
was a Yorkshire lad, born at Horsforth, near
Leeds, on the 28th of July, 1764, and was
brought up under the fostering care of good old-
fashioned Methodism. In due time, however, it was
found out that he had not only the desire to become
a minister, but showed certain gifts for the office ;
so, after his youth had been spent at the Free
Grammar School of Hull, he was selected by the
Elland Society to go to Cambridge and prepare him-
self for holy orders.

Little is known of his student life at St. John's,
but one who was his lifelong friend. Dr. Mason Good,

25

26 AMONG THE MAORIS.

said of Marsden at that time : " Young as he was
he was remarkable for firmness of principle, an
intrepidity of spirit, a suavity of manner, a strong
judgment, and above all, a mind stored with know-
ledge, and deeply impressed with religious truth,
which promised the happiest results." He seems from
the earliest to have had a deep desire to minister to
the spiritual wants of the heathen, and the news
which had from time to time come to his ears of
Australia and New Zealand led his thoughts in that
direction with yearning for work.

It was, therefore, a welcome surprise for him to
find that through the influence of Mr. Simeon at
Cambridge, and Wilberforce in London, he was
appointed by the Government on the ist of January,
1793, as second chaplain of the settlement then
known as " His Majesty's territory of New South
Wales." A singularly modest man, he accepted the
position with some misgivings as to his merit. He
was "sensible of the importance of the post, so
sensible, indeed, that he hardly dared to accept it on
any terms ; but if no more proper person could be
found, he would consent to undertake it." This
important step being finally arranged, he settled
another, which was scarcely of less consequence, by
marrying Miss Elizabeth Tristan, the devoted wife
of forty-two future years. It is related that during his
honeymoon he was officiating in a church, when, just
as he was entering the pulpit, the gun was fired from
the ship to summon him on board ; he immediately
left the church with his bride on his arm, the whole
congregation following him to the shore, and waving
their farewells and good wishes as the boat took him
and Mrs. Marsden away. He soon found that being
on shipboard was a very disagreeable experience ; not

MARSDEN GOES FORTH. 27

only was he terribly ill with sea-sickness, but, what
was even more distressing to him, those on board the
ship — officers, crew, and pensioners — were utterly
wicked. He writes, doubtless with a shaky hand and
under depressed feelings, the following in his journal
of the first day: — "This morning we weighed anchor
with a fair wind, and have sailed well all day. How
different this Sabbath is from what I have been
accustomed to ! Once I could meet the people of
God and assemble with them in the House of Prayer,
but now am I deprived of this valuable privilege, and
instead of living amongst those who love to serve the
Lord Jesus, spending the Sabbath in prayer and
praise, I hear nothing but oaths and blasphemies.
Lord, keep me in the midst of these, and grant that
I may neither in word nor deed countenance their
wicked practices."

England was then involved in war with France,
and Marsden's ship, with a number of others, proceeded
under care of a man-of-war. For a long time he could
not persuade the captain to grant him permission to
preach to the crew ; he asserted that he had never seen
a religious sailor, but on the second Sunday in October,
having been nearly three months at sea, he makes an
entry in his diary with much thanksgiving : —

" I arose this morning with a great desire to preach
to the ship's company, yet did not know how I should
be able to accomplish my wish. We were now four
ships in company. Our captain had invited the
captains belonging to the other three to dine with us
to-day. As soon as they came on board I mentioned
my designs to one of them, who immediately complied
with my wish, and said he would mention it to our
captain, which he did, and preparations were made for
me to preach. I read part of the Church prayers, and

28 AMONG THE MAORIS.

afterwards preached from the 3rd chapter of St. John,
the 14th and 15th verses: 'As ]\Ioses Hfted up the
serpent in the wilderness,' etc. The sailors stood on
the main deck, I and the four captains on the quarter
deck ; they were attentive, and the good effects were
apparent during the remainder of the day."

But the daring unrighteousness of his surroundings
weighed heavily on the heart of Samuel Marsden. It
seemed as if their hearts were as the nether millstone;
and it was already a foretaste of the heathenish spirit
which he was destined to meet. His godly wife was
his constant solace and helper, and in the quiet of his
cabin with his Bible on his knee, he would find
refreshment in the green pastures and by the still
waters of the Word of God. He also found a great
encouragement in reading the life of David Brainerd ;
and this missionary's story of his trials among the
North American Indians gave keen edge to his desire
to go in like manner to the heathen in the Southern
Seas. In truth, he had heathen enough for the
present on shipboard. " I am surrounded," he says,
" with evil-disposed persons — thieves, adulterers, and
blasphemers. May God keep me from evil, that
I may not be tainted by the evil practices of those
among whom I live." That he spoke fearlessly and
faithfully to these men about their sins, there can be
no doubt ; the long voyage of nine months giving him
ample opportunity of declaring to these hardened
sailors and convicts the whole counsel of God.

When at last, on the 2nd day of March, 1794, a
hundred years ago, he stepped ,on the shore of
Australia for the first time, it was with a full heart,
praising God for his preservation thus far. He was
quartered in the barracks of Paramatta, near Port
Jackson, and found himself in charge of the very

MARSDEX GOES FORTH. 29

refuse of England, a convict establishment without
any of the humane accompaniments of such places in
these da}'s. He makes the following note in his
diary about his first Sunday there : — " Saw several
persons at work as I went along, to whom I spoke
and warned them of the evil of Sabbath breaking.
My mind was deeply affected with the wickedness
I beheld going on. I spoke from the 6th chapter of
Revelation : ' Behold the great day of His wrath is
come, and who shall be able to stand ? ' As I was
returning home a young man followed me into the
wood, and told me that he was distressed for the
salvation of his soul. He seemed to manifest the
strongest marks of contrition and to be truly
awakened to a sense of his danger. I hope the Lord
will have many souls in this place.'"' The senior
chaplain soon afterwards gave up the work and sailed
home, leaving Marsden alone to cope with the
immense responsibilities of the position.

In order to fully understand the work he had to
perform, and what had led to the present settlement,
it is necessary to glance backward to the earlier days
of Botany Bay. \\'hen Sir Joseph Banks, who had
been with Captain Cook to the island, proposed in
1788 the establishing of a penal settlement on the
shores of Australia, the project was treated with
contemptuous scorn. It was objected to on the
ground of a wasteful expense, for anticipations were
freely indulged in of the whole colony becoming food
for the hungry Maori. In due time, however, the first
fleet of convict ships set sail with a small military
force, and, amid the wilderness of Port Jackson,
Governor Philips unfurled the English flag, and the
first rude habitations were built upon the spot
destined to become the beautiful city of Sydney.

30 AMONCi THE MAORIS.

But the civilisation which had been introduced to this
distant field was of the most degraded kind, the vilest
denizens of the vile prisons of Europe brought to
their new home all the wicked practices and the
unchecked brutality of their lives. Many of them
obtained tickets of leave, and settling down made
money fast, and soon a rough and corrupt state of
society was established, where both master and men
were of the same criminal class, and connived in the
wrong-doings of each other. The administration of
the law was, under such conditions, a matter of
great difficulty, and if the crimes were many, the
dreadful punishments adjudged to carry terror into
the hearts of evil doers were vindictively severe.

In the midst of such a state of things Samuel
Marsden came, not only to be the sole representative
of religion, but speedily to be elected to the difficult
position of magistrate. Such a dual position must in
any case seriously impair the usefulness of a chaplain ;
but it should be remembered that he was a Government
servant, and as such had to be responsible for the
authority of the law being regarded with respect.
His new office soon brought him into conflict with
the governor and his fellow-magistrates ; he
courageously opposed their extreme severity, and
his own high-spirited and energetic temperament
provoked collisions which spread slander and perse-
cution in the colony, and even as far as England.
For years he endured the most spiteful opposition,
and in some cases had to vindicate his character by
an appeal to courts of law. In addition to these
discouragements he had to suffer domestic bereave-
ment of peculiar bitterness. His little first-born son
of two years had fallen out of his mother's arms while
travelling over the rough country in a gig and was

MARSDEN GOES FORTH. 3 1

killed. A short time afterwards his remaining child
was left at home during one of their journeys, so that
a like fate might not happen to him, when by the
carelessness of a servant the child was scalded to
death. It is said that he bore this double calamity
with " calm and ev^en dignified submission, for he
was a man who said little, though he felt much."
The ploughshare of suffering had cut very deep in
the heart of this man, and he learnt thus early in
his career to have a sympathy with all who are weary
and heavy laden.

In the year 1801 he addressed to the London
Missionary Society a memorandum on the prospects
of mission work in Tahiti and the islands of the
South Seas, and his suggestions as to the proper
requisites of a missionary, and the best methods to
ensure success, are of much interest. He had already
begun to look farther afield than the sphere of his
chaplaincy, and yearned to preach the Gospel to the
people in the lands afar off. Especially had his heart
gone forth to New Zealand. From time to time
Maoris had crossed the sea to visit the white settle-
ment at New South Wales, and these visits had
awakened a remarkable interest in the mind of the
convict chaplain. He bade them welcome to his
house, talked with them about their country, and soon
it became known to all natives who came, that
Marsden was their friend and would give them
counsel and protection.

" My father had sometimes," writes one of his
daughters, " as many as thirty New Zealanders stay-
ing at the Parsonage. He possessed extraordinary
influence over them. On one occasion a young lad,
the nephew of a chief, died, and his uncle immediately
made preparations to sacrifice a slave to attend his

32 AMONG THE MAORIS.

spirit in the other world. Mr. Marsden was from
home at the moment, and his family were only able
to preserve the life of the young New Zealandcr by
hiding him in one of their rooms. Mr. Marsden no
sooner returned and reasoned with the chief than he
consented to spare his life. No further attempt was
made upon it, though the uncle frequently deplored
his nephew had no attendant in the next world, and
seemed afraid to return to New Zealand lest the
father of the young man should reproach him for
having given up this, to them, important point."

Marsden determined to lay the whole question of a
special mission to New Zealand before the Church
Missionary Society at home, and returned to England
in 1807, on board the Buffalo, an old merchant vessel
which narrowly escaped going to the bottom.

He stayed in England two years, and during this
time he laid before the Committee of the Society the
whole case of the New Zealand field. He urged
them to adopt the policy of first civilising the natives
and then preaching to them the riches of the Gospel.
His point was : " Commerce and the arts having a
natural tendency to inculcate industry, and moral
habits open the way for the introduction of the
Gospel and lay the foundation for its continuance
when once received. Nothing can pave the way for
the introduction of the Gospel but civilisation. The
arts and religion should go together. I do not mean
a native should learn to build a hut or make an axe
before he should be told of man's fall and redemption,
but that these grand subjects should be introduced at
every favourable opportunity, while the natives are
learning any of the simple arts." To these views the
founders of the Church Missionary Society gave a
qualified approval. They felt that the first thing was

MARSDEN GOES FORTH. 33

to preach the Gospel, and that it would be unwise to
defer its proclamation on the ground that civilisation
would first effect a reformation as its pioneer. In
sending forth their first missionaries, the Society
issued a statement vindicating their position on this
very point, and their final instructions to Mr. William
Hall and Mr. John King were : " Ever bear in mind
that the only object of the Society in sending you to
New Zealand is to introduce the knowledge of Christ
among the natives, and, in order to do this, the arts of
civilised life." The wisdom of their decision has been
confirmed by the subsequent history of missionary
enterprise, and their exhortation concluded with the
following clear statement of the case : " Do not
mistake civilisation for conversion. Do not imagine
when heathens are raised in intellect, in the know-
ledge of the arts and outward decencies, above their
fellow-countrymen, that they are Christians, and
therefore rest content as if your proper work were
accomplished. Our great aim is far higher : it is to
make them children of God and heirs of His glory.
Let this be your desire and prayer and labour among
them. And while you rejoice in communicating
every other good, think little or nothing done, till you
see those who were dead in trespasses and sins
quickened together with Christ."

In later life when IMarsden could review the work
of many years, he saw that his first impression was an
error in judgment, for he said : " Civilisation is not
necessary before Christianity ; do both together if
you will, but you will find civilisation follow Christi-
anity more easily than Christianity follow civilisation."

Accompanied by Messrs. Hall and King as the only
men who volunteered to assist in such a hazardous
enterprise, for the scare of cannibal Maoris was still

c

34

AMONG THE MAORIS.

rife, Samuel Marsdcn, in August, 1809, set sail from
England, wiiich he was viewing for the last time !
He wrote to a friend, on the eve of his departure, a
letter which, just tinged with a shade of natural regret
at leaving his land and friends, shows that he had set
his face steadfastly to accomplish his mission to the
poor darkened aborigines on the other side of the
world.

" Yesterday," he writes, " I assisted my much
esteemed friend, Mr. Simeon, but here I shall have
no continuing city. The signal will soon be given,
the anchor weighed and the sails spread, and the
ships compelled to enter the mighty ocean to seek
for distant lands. I was determined to take another
look at Cambridge, though conscious that I could but
enjoy those beautiful scenes for a moment. In a few
days we shall set off for Portsmouth. All this turning
and wheeling about from place to place and from
nation to nation, I trust is the right way to the
heavenly Canaan. ... I believe that God has
gracious designs towards New South Wales, and that
His Gospel will take root there and spread amongst
the heathen nations to the glory of His name."

CHAPTER III.

DUATERRA AND OTHERS.

" In Thee we move ; all things of Thee
Are full, Thou Source and life of all,
Thou vast unfathomable sea !

(Fall prostrate, lost in wonder fall,
Ye sons of men, for God in man)
All may we lose, so Thee we gain."

MARSDEN had not been on board many days
before he made a discovery which awakened
his deepest interest. He had noticed in the
forecastle a poor emaciated man of colour,
covered by a ragged and dirty old coat, and evidently
in a deplorable condition. To his astonishment he
found this miserable stranger to be a New Zealand
chief, and soon conversing with him in his own
tongue, IMarsden drew from him his sad story.
Like many another of his countrymen on meeting
with white men, he was ambitious to know more
of the visitors, and, if possible, to see the wonderful
land from which they came. He went to work as
a sailor on board one of the whaling ships, and after

35

36 AMONG THE MAORIS.

six months was pitilessly put on shore in a state of
desolation without a penny of pay. Nothing daunted,
however, Duaterra (for that was the poor man's name),
became a sailor on another ship ; there he was more
kindly treated, and put on Norfolk Island with others,
where they endured great privations, having for three
months nothing to eat but an occasional seal and
birds, and no water to drink but what the heavens
afforded from time to time. His next voyage was
to England under promise to see King George, but
immediately he landed in London he was again
deserted, ill-used, and finally put on board the out-
ward-bound ship, y^;/;/, whose human cargo comprised
a number of convicts and Samuel Marsden and his
mission party.

The indignation of Marsden was aroused, and it
was well that the captain of the vessel which had
brought him to England was not within reach to
answer for his inhuman treatment of the man. How-
ever, his constant care and medicine soon produced
a change for the better in the New Zealander, and
there arose between the two men a bond of affection
and gratitude which was to perform good work and
service in the future of the Mission to the Maoris.
He stayed with his deliverer six months after their
arrival at Sydney, and returned to his native land
deeply impressed with the tender-hearted Christian
character of almost the only Englishman who had not
betrayed his confidence.

Troubles were in store for the Chaplain, who had in
time past already borne so much persecution in the
colonies. The governor, a man of resolute self-will,
was overbearing to him, and not only harshly treated
the Chaplain in his magisterial capacity because he
declined to associate with some convicts who had

DUATERRA AND OTHERS. 37

been appointed to the bench of magistrates, but
dictated to him what he ought and ought not to
preach from the pulpit. Now there is no doubt that
Marsden was himself a high-spirited and sensitive
man, and neither flattery nor menaces could move
him from what he felt was his rightful position in the
colony. His plain preaching also made him enemies,
and on more than one occasion his life was in danger.
One day, walking by a river, Marsden saw a convict
plunge in evidently to drown himself The next
moment the Chaplain's coat was off, and he was in
the water to rescue the man who, however, struggled
for the mastery, and tried to hold Marsden's head
under water. When, eventually, he was brought to
land he confessed with much penitence that he had
been so stung with remorse, under a sermon which
Marsden had preached the Sunday before, that he
determined to attract the preacher's sympathies by
jumping into the water, and then try to drown him
for declaring so openly the vices he had committed.

But the eyes of Marsden were towards New Zealand,
and the visits of the Maoris from time to time made
him long to leave the worries of his chaplaincy and
go to their land to preach the Gospel. His three
English laymen, Mr. Kendall having now joined them,
went and through Duaterra's influence were kindly
received ; but the governor of the colony forbade
Marsden adventuring himself on such a mad and
reckless enterprise. In the meantime Marsden sent
Duaterra some corn for sowing, and this, the first
introduction of wheat into New Zealand, caused the
liveliest interest and excitement among the natives.
When Duaterra sowed his little field they laughed
him to scorn, and at harvest time when he prepared to
grind it in an old coffee-mill, which did not work

38 AMONG THE MAORIS.

successfully, they held him in still greater derision.
But in due time the grinding was accomplished, cakes
made of the flour were baked in a frying-pan, and
when handed round for tasting their joy knew no
bounds. Such a result did more even than the words
of Duaterra to persuade the natives to receive favour-
ably the three white lay missionaries. At last
Marsden was allowed to go himself, and, having
purchased the Active, probably the pioneer missionary
ship, he set sail on the 19th of November, 18 14, with
a party of English men and women, Maori chiefs and
convicts, sheep and poultry. When they landed they
found a violent tribal war in progress, and Marsden
determined first of all to try to bring this to an end.

There are not many incidents in missionary history
more notable and heroic than this, of two lone Eng-
lishmen, Marsden and his friend Nicholas, unarmed,
going deliberately to a hostile camp of savage can-
nibals to live with them. When they arrived and had
sat down amongst the warriors, one of them named
George, who knew English, acted as interpreter, and
explained the object of the visit of the white strangers.
Their first night under such strange circumstances is
depicted by Marsden himself in one of his letters : —
'• As the evening advanced the people began to retire
to rest in different groups. About eleven o'clock Mr.
Nicholas and I wrapped ourselves in our greatcoats
and prepared for rest. George directed me to lie by
his side. His wife and child lay on the right hand
and Mr. Nicholas close by. The night was clear, the
stars shone bright, and the sea in our front was smooth.
Around us were innumerable spears stuck upright
in the ground and groups of natives lying in all
directions, like a flock of sheep upon the grass, as
there were neither tents nor huts to cover them. I

DUATERRA AND OTHERS. 39

viewed our present position with sensations and
feelings I cannot express, surrounded by cannibals
who had massacred and devoured our countrymen.
I wondered much at the mysteries of Providence and
how these things could be. Never did I behold the
blessed advantage of civilisation in a more grateful
light than now. I did not sleep much during the
night. My mind was too seriously occupied by the
present scene and the new and strange ideas it natur-
ally excited. About three in the morning I rose and
walked about the camp, surveying the different natives.
When the morning light returned we beheld men and
women and children asleep in all directions like the
beasts of the field."

His efforts towards peace were crowned with success,
and he had the felicity of seeing the two rival and
bloodthirsty chiefs rubbing noses together in amity
and concord. The astonishment of the natives when
for the first time they saw a horse and a cow was
immense. Hitherto a pig was the mightiest of quad-
rupeds to them, and when Marsden mounted one of
the horses and set it to a gallop, they were speechless
with astonishment. They received presents from
Marsden with gratitude, and promised that they would
never again repeat their cruel and vindictive treat-
ment of the English as in the case of the ship Boyd.

The Union Jack was now brought from the ship
and hoisted on a flagstaff, beneath which the first
religious service was conducted by Marsden in a
simple pulpit constructed out of a canoe. The scene
was very remarkable and denoted the first step to-
wards Christian teaching in New Zealand. He must
tell the story himself: —

" On Sunday morning, when I was on deck, I saw
the English flag flying, which was a pleasing sight in

40 AMONG THE MAORIS.

New Zealand. I considered it as the signal and the
dawn of civilisation, liberty, and religion in that dark
and benighted land. I never viewed the British
colours with more gratification, and flattered myself
they would never be removed till the nations of that
island enjoyed all the happiness of British subjects.
About ten o'clock I prepared to go ashore to publish
for the first time the glad tidings of the Gospel.
I was under no apprehension for the safety of the
ship and, therefore, ordered all on board to go on
shore to attend Divine service, except the master and
one man. When we landed we found Korokoro,
Duaterra, and Shimgie dressed in regimentals which
Governor Macquire had given them, with their men
drawn up ready to be marched into the enclosure
to attend Divine service. They had their swords by
their sides and switches in their hands. We entered
the enclosure, and were placed on the seats on each
side of the pulpit. Korokoro marched his men and
placed them on my right hand in the rear of the
Europeans ; and Duaterra placed his men on the left.
The inhabitants of the town, with the women and
children and a number of other chiefs, formed a circle
round the whole. A very solemn silence prevailed,
the sight was truly impressive. I rose up and began
the service with singing the Old Hundredth psalm,
and felt my very soul melt within me when I viewed
my congregation, and considered the state they were
in.

" After reading the service, during which the natives
stood up and sat down at the signal given by
Korokoro's switch, which was regulated by the move-
ments of the Europeans, it being Christmas I preached
from the second chapter of St. Luke's gospel, and
tenth verse — ' Behold I bring you glad tidings of

DUATERRA AND OTHERS.

41

great joy, etc' The natives told Duaterra that they
could not understand what I meant. He replied that
they were not to mind that now for they would under-
stand by-and-by, and that he would explain my
meaning as far as he could.

" When I had done preaching he informed them
what I had been talking about. Duaterra was very
much pleased that he had been able to make all the

%:^__ \v

A MAORI COUNCIL OV WAR.

necessary preparations for the performances of Divine
worship in so short a time, and we felt much obliged
to him for his attention. He was extremely anxious
to convince us that he would do everything in his
power, and that the good of his country was his
principal consideration.

" In this manner the Gospel has been introduced

42 AMONG THE MAORIS.

into New Zealand, and I fervently pray that the glory
of it may never depart from its inhabitants till time
shall be no more."

One of the most encouraging instances of the
fulfilment of these pious desires of Marsden is the
case of Rangi, a chief who heard for the first time the
news of the Gospel during the cruise of the Active.

His conversion, which followed a few days after-
wards, soon made an outward difference in the life of
the old man. It showed itself, as is commonly the
case among the heathen, by an observance of the
Sabbath. Whenever the sacred day dawned Rangi
hoisted a piece of red cloth above his tent, and told
the people of his tribe that it was a day to be kept
holy. He showed by his patience under acute suffer-
ing that God was with him. A long and arduous life
of warfare began to tell upon the old man, and it
became only too evident to his neighbours that before
long Rangi would die. But while his physical frame
weakened, his mind was clearer than ever, and he
could answer the questions of his sympathising
friends with quiet composure.

Somebody had asked him what his ideas were
about death. " My thoughts," he replied, " are con-
tinually in heaven, in the morning, at midday, and at
night. My belief is in the great God and in Jesus
Christ." They told him that he would go to heaven
where there would be no more pain or tears, or
suffering. They supposed that at times he felt it almost
too good to be true. " This is what I sometimes
think when I am alone. I think I shall go to heaven,
and then I think perhaps I shall not go there, and
possibly this God of the white people may not be my
God ; and then after I have been thinking in this
way, and my heart has been cast down, it again

DUATERRA AND OTHERS. 43

becomes more cheerful, and the thought that I shall
go to heaven remains last." He was assured these
were temptations of the devil, and God would deliver
him. " I pray several times a day," he said ; " I ask
God to give me His spirit that He may dwell in my
heart and remain there. I think of the love of Christ,
and I ask Him to wash this bad heart and to give me
a new heart. When I think of heaven and of Jesus
Christ I am glad, because when I die I shall leave
this flesh and these bones here, and my soul will go
to heaven." At another time his mind was clearly
dwelling on the atonement, and how his debt of sin
had been paid on the Cross. " I have nothing to give
Him," he said trustfully, and with humility, "only
I believe that He is the true God, and I believe in
Jesus Christ."

The end of the old man drew near, and he
continued even more earnestly to express his faith
in God and counsel his friends to follow his example.
His last words, full of pathetic sincerity and love,
were these : —

" I have prayed to God and to Jesus Christ, and
my heart feels full of light."

Surely such a death was more like a blessed
beginning of life, for he who had lived in the dark-
ness of superstition saw now the glorious rising of
the Sun of Righteousness, and stretched forth his
weary hands towards the everlasting day.

As an evidence of the new spirit infused into the
natives, the missionaries found that they could hold
their services in the open air, surrounded by -Maoris
whose spears were stuck in the ground ready to hand,
and whose deadly short weapons, called pattoo-
pattoos, were hidden away under their cloaks.
Marsden felt how constantly he was in their power,

44 AMONG THE MAORIS.

and often sleeping at the foot of some huge tree,
his thoughts would wander to the unenlightened
inhabitants of these dense forests, who bore the
unenviable reputation of being the most bloodthirsty
of mankind. But looking up at the silent stars, this
servant of God realised that he was safe in the Divine
keeping, and he asked himself by what wonderful
guidance of God's Providence he had been led lo
that place and work? " If busy imagination inquired
what I did there, I had no answer to seek in wild
conjecture ; I felt with gratitude, I had not come by
chance, but had been sent to labour in preparing the
way of the Lord in this dreary wilderness, where the
voice of joy and gladness had never been heard ; and
I could not but anticipate with joyful hope the
period when the Daystar from on high would dawn
and shine on this dark and heathen land, and cause
the very earth on which we were then reposed to bring
forth its increase, when God Himself would give the
poor inhabitants His blessing."

To this good man, amid all his discouragements,
God vouchsafed many visible results of his work.
One native, who had become a teacher, might have
been seen instructing others in the truths of
Christianity, and going forward from time to time
preaching the love of God to sinners. This man is
said to have been able to repeat the whole of the
liturgical service of the Church of England by heart,
an achievement in which he would have few com-
petitors even among the pale faces.

— i.s'&g^-H^^^-

>■---

CHAPTER IV.

"WOUNDED IN THE HOUSE OF HIS FRIENDS."

" Though waves and storms go o'er my head,

Though strength and health and friends be gone,
Though joys be withered all and dead,

Though every comfort be withdrawn,
On this my steadfast soul relies,
Father, Thy mercy never dies."

THE radiant commencement of his work in New
Zealand caused ]\Iarsden much satisfaction,
but his hopes were soon to be dashed to the
ground by a series of untoward circumstances.
Sunshine and shadow is the lot of all true workers
for Christ, and the darker seasons, though hard to
experience, are never without their profit to the
teachable spirit. This heroic and devoted man had
already suffered many things, but he was destined
to bear a still heavier load. The first blow was the
death of Duaterra, his son in the faith and valuable
helper in dealing with the natives. He had suddenly
fallen ill, and though in the prime of his manhood
and strength soon drew near to death. Marsden

45

46 AMONG THE MAORTS.

was with him a short time before his death, and was
grieved to see that the superstitious rites of his people
were practised as he passed from time into eternity.
His priest, the great chief Shunghai, and others, were
cutting themselves with knives, and his wife had
hanged herself from a beam in an adjoining room as
a token of affection. The poor dying man, shadowed
by these heathen surroundings, and incessantly plied
by the priest of his tribe with invocations to the gods,
was quite bewildered and distressed. To Marsden
the event was a mysterious Providence. " I could not
but view Duatcrra," he wrote afterwards, " as he lay
dying, with wonder and astonishment, and could
scarcely bring myself to believe that the Divine
goodness would remove from the earth a man whose
life appeared of such infinite importance to his
country, which was just emerging from barbarism
and superstition. In reflecting on this awful mysteri-
ous event, I am led to exclaim with the Apostle of the
Gentiles, ' O the depth of the riches both of the
wisdom and knowledge of God ! how unsearchable
are His judgments, and His ways past finding out ! ' "
When Duaterra passed away, the spell of his
influence was broken, and the restrained heathenism
set free, and tribal wars and cruelty became common.
Of course the mission work suffered, and in some cases
hostile crowds of natives surrounded the Wesleyan
mission places, threatening the lives of the mission-
aries. In the midst of this peril, however, these
devoted men held on, and during anxious months,
threatened by savage New Zealanders and unrelieved
by any help from over the sea, they trusted in God,
and held fast to the promises of His word. Their
meals were eaten in readiness to march like the
Israelites at the passover, their little children were laid

"WOUNDED IX THE HOUSE OF HIS FRIENDS. 47

to rest in their cots fully dressed in case of emergency,
and they waited expecting every day to bring the
critical moment when to save their lives they must
put out to sea. But He whose eye is ever upon His
children, and whose arm is ever mighty to save,
suffered them not to die, for the wave of persecution
and vengeance passed by, and once more they could
in safety and peace go forth to their work.

News of this, however, coming to Marsden's ears,
greatly distressed him, and the experience was
especially bitter, because he was just then under
painful circumstances of persecution from his own
countrymen. In the colony (from whence he visited
New Zealand from time to time) Marsden had made
many enemies through his championship of the
weak ; and his interference in the judicial and social
questions of the settlement brought upon his devoted
head a rain of slander and reproach. Marsden had
evidently ideas which were a century too soon for the
people of his time. Had he lived in our day he
would have received well-merited approbation instead
of blame. He bravely denounced the profligacy of
the officials, and with equal earnestness exposed the
abuses of their administration. It is only necessary
to cite one case to show how much reform was needed
in the colony. The condition of the female convicts
was deplorable beyond description. Marsden went
himself into the factories where they were employed,
and found these poor women toiling long hours in a
pestilential atmosphere, eating their food as best they
could, and sleeping amongst the wool and refuse
upon which they worked. They were speedily trans-
ferred to the hospital, which was scarcely more
satisfactory, and there, in his ministrations as chaplain,
Marsden met them again. In language not a whit

48 AMONG THE AfAORIS.

too severe, he remonstrated with the governor of the
colony. " As their minister," he wrote, " I must
answer ere long at the bar of Divine justice for my
duty to these objects of vice and woe, and often feel
inexpressible anguish of spirit at the moment of their
approaching dissolution, on my own and their
account, and follow them to the grave with awful
forebodings, lest I should be found at last to have
neglected any part of my public duty as their
minister and magistrate, and, by so doing, contributed
to their eternal ruin."

Such reflections did not impress the very mixed
European officialism of the place, and, after waiting
eighteen months, he appealed to the Government at
home, and this act set the colony in a blaze of
exasperation. The most scandalous libels were
circulated to destroy his reputation, and this persecu-
tion became so unbearable that he had to " appeal to
Caesar," and find legal redress and vindication in the
civil courts. The charges made against him had
involved the integrity of other missionaries, so that
the moral victory he gained in the verdict was a
wide-spread blessing. Letters of congratulation
from his friends in England flowed in upon him.
Lord Gambier, a Christian admiral of the fleet, in a
long letter said : " I deeply lament with you that your
very zealous and arduous exertions to extend the
kingdom of our gracious Lord, and to diffuse the
knowledge of the glorious Gospel of salvation among
the inhabitants of the dark regions around you,
should meet with the spirit of opposition from the
persons in the colony whom you would naturally look
to for support and assistance." His old friend, the
venerable Charles Simeon of Cambridge, wrote him
some loving words, and Wilberforce was commissioned

"WOUNDED IN THE HOUSE OF HIS FRIENDS." 49

to express to him the confidence of the Government
and the House of Commons also. But perhaps the
most interesting of these letters is that of Elizabeth
Fry, whose humane and tender heart was deeply
touched by what he had done and suffered. " I am
sorry/' she writes, " that thou hast had so many trials
and discouragements in filling thy very important
station, and I cannot h'elp hoping and believing thy
labours will prove not to have been in vain, and even
if thou shouldst not fully see the fruit of thy labours,
others I trust will reap the advantage of them, so that
the words of Scripture may be verified, 'That both
he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice
together.' "

After this, Marsden took ship again to New Zealand,
and continued his missionary journeys through the
island, staying generally eight or ten months at a time.
He paid great attention to the relations which existed
between the European settlers who had stayed there
for the purpose of trade, and did his utmost to dis-
courage the use of firearms and alcoholic drink
among the natives. Then, as now, these evil adjuncts
of civilisation had begun to degrade the heathen, and
Marsden, when he saw the dreadful consequences of
such barter, wrote sadly, " I think it much more to
the honour of religion and the good of New Zealand
even to give up the Mission for the present than to
trade with the natives in those articles." He saw
with painful reality that education, contact with
Europeans, and increase of knowledge and refinement
did not change the character of the Maoris. Nothing
but genuine conversion by the saving power of the
blood of Jesus Christ could make such vile and
degraded savages into new creatures. Utterly fear-
less, he went alone into the midst of these wild people,

D

so AMONG THE MAORIS.

preaching the Gospel with power. He walked many-
miles through trackless forests and wide plains, sleep-
ing under the star-spangled sky with his head on a
heap of ferns, and suffering cheerily all the hardships
and privations which such a life involved. His
thoughts were full of sweetness and consolation.
" When I have lain down upon the ground after a
weary day's journey, wrapped up in my greatcoat,
surrounded only by cannibals, I often thought how
many thousands there are in civil life, languishing
upon beds of down, and saying with Job, ' in the
evening would God it were morning,' while I could
sleep free from fear or pain under the guardian care
of Him who keepeth Israel,"

On every hand he received kindness from the
natives, and saw, to his great joy, that they listened
with much attention to his preaching about salvation
by Jesus Christ. He prepared with infinite patience
a grammar of the language, so that the Word of Life
might be infused into their own hearts direct. Seeing
also the frightful devastation and cruelty of their
tribal wars, he laboured hard with the chiefs to per-
suade them to establish peace, and to settle their
difficulties without resorting to the weapons of conflict.
He became the peacemaker between many, although,
in one or two instances, they would not listen to his
injunctions.

On one occasion he suffered an experience of ship-
wreck very much like that of the Apostle of the
Gentiles. He had been on a visit to the Wesleyan
Mission Station at Wangaroa, and found both the
Rev. Samuel Leigh and his wife very ill. He per-
suaded them to accompany him to Sydney or Port
Jackson for rest and change. On their journey,
however, they met with stormy weather, and the

" WOUNDED IN THE HOUSE OF HIS FRIENDS." 5 1

vessel was driven on to the rocks upon an unknown
and inhospitable coast. Marsden launched a small
boat, and, taking Mr. and' Mrs. Leigh with him,
reached an island, where the natives met them and
made them a fire, preparing a hut of bulrushes for
their protection from the storm. The other persons
on board were rescued, and, although the ship was
lost, no harm came to any one of the party. Mr.

SYDNEY HARliOUR.

Leigh felt grateful to God, and had a still firmer
confidence in the character of New Zealanders and
Marsden's power over them.

" For several days," he wrote, " we were in their
power, and they might have taken all we had with
the greatest ease ; but instead of oppressing and
robbing us, they actually sympathised with us in our

52 AMONG THE MAORIS.

trials and afflictions. Mr. Marsden, Mrs. Leigh, and
myself were at a native village for several days and
nights without any food but what the natives brought
us willingly, who said, ' Poor creatures, you have
nothing to eat, and you are not accustomed to our
kind of food.' I shall never forget the sympathy and
kindness of these poor heathens."

Marsden was always much struck with the fine
characteristics of these New Zealanders, and felt the
time had come for the Christian Church to bring the
Gospel more fully within their reach. " They offer up
human sacrifices," says he, " as sin offerings. When-
ever the Gospel shall be revealed to them they will
very easily understand the doctrine of the atonement.
They demand a sacrifice or an atonement for almost
everything which they consider as an injury. ... It
is only the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of
God, that can subdue their hearts to the obedience of
the faith. I am of opinion that civilisation and
Christianity will go hand in hand, if means are used
at the same time to introduce both, and one will
aid and assist the other. To bring this noble race of
human beings to a knowledge of the only true God
and Jesus Christ, is an attempt worthy of the Christian
world. I believe that God has stirred up the hearts
of His people to pray for them, and to open both
their hearts and their purses to prosper the work and
raise up a people from amongst these savages to call
them blessed."

One of the missionaries relates the following con-
versation between a chief and himself: — He com-
menced by saying that his old heart was gone, and
that a new one was come in its place. " Gone !
whither?" "It is buried, I have cast it away from
me." " How long has it been gone ? " '' Four days."

"WOUNDED IX THE HOUSE OF HIS FRIENDS. 53

''■ What was your old heart like ? " " Like a dog, like
a deaf man ; it would not listen to the missionaries,
nor understand." " How long have you had your old
heart?" "Always till now, but it is now gone."
" What is your new heart like ? " " Like yours ; it is
very good." " Where is its goodness ? " " It is alto-
gether good ; it tells me to lie down and sleep all day
on Sunday, and not go and fight." " Is that all the
goodness of your new heart ? " " Yes." " Does it not
tell you to pray to Jesus Christ ? " " Yes ; it tells me
I must pray to Him when the sun rises, when the sun
stands in the middle of the heavens, and when the sun
sets." " When did you pray last ? " " This morning."
" What did you pray for ? " "I said, O Jesus Christ,
give me a blanket in order that I may believe." " I
fear your old heart still remains, does it not ? " " No :
the new one is quite fixed ; it is /iere," pointing to his
throat. " But the new heart that comes from God
does not pray in that way." " How then ? " The
missionary then proceeded to point out to him some-
thing of the nature of prayer ; what he should pray
for ; and how ready and willing God was to answer.
"As I was leaving," says the missionary, "he told
me that I must ask him, on coming again to his
residence, whether he remembered what I had now
said, and that, if he had forgotten it, I must tell him
all over again."

It was well that the interest of these natives so
occupied ]\Iarsden's mind at this season, for the
calumnies to which he was subjected in Sydney made
the colony a very undesirable and unhappy place for
him to live in. But his letters exhibit a spirit of
patience and forbearance.

At the close of the year 1826 he prepared to make
his fourth journey to New Zealand, and heard with

54 AMONG THE MAORll^

much concern that disastrous changes had taken
place in the attitude of the natives, and that the
Wcsleyan missionaries had only just escaped with
their lives. Under what circumstances the work had
been started, and how the disaster had befallen, may
be told in this place. The Rev. Samuel Leigh had
arrived as Wesleyan missionary to New Zealand not
very long after the massacre of the crew and pas-
sengers of the Boyd had filled the minds of the people
with horror.

Undismayed, he landed very near to the spot where
the Boyd had been wrecked, not by choice, but
because the native boatmen, fearing an approaching
storm, had laid themselves on the bottom of the boat,
as dead men, and left the navigation of the boat to
the English missionary. Thus it was that it drifted
into Wangaroa Harbour, and when he set his foot on
shore he noticed the hulk of the Boyd not far distant
on the rocks, and a crowd of wild savages rushing
down to the beach brandishing their weapons on his
approach.

He asked for the chief, and went unarmed and
alone to a hut to spend the night, not to sleep, for
the clamour of the cannibals was deafening in the
darkness. This chief on the morrow talked in broken
English about the massacre and eating of the people
of the Boyd with perfect unconcern, and Mr. Leigh,
suspecting treachery, signed to his native boatmen
to keep well inland, waiting for him. In a few
minutes he was surrounded by threatening and armed
savages, the chief, upon whom he had relied, looking
on without any gesture of disapproval. As he slowly
turned backwards towards the boat, he felt his hour
had come, when suddenly, taking a packet from his
pocket, he cried, " Stand back ! I have fish-hooks," and

"WOUNDED IN fHE HOUSE OF HIS FRIENDS. 55

flung them over their heads. This turned their atten-
tion for a moment or two, and he escaped in his boat
as by a miracle.

And yet such was the heroism of the witness for
the truth, that he returned sometime afterwards with
his wife and others, and landed at the same spot.
The chief remembered his fish-hooks, and Mr. Leigh
conducted a religious service which laid the founda-
tion of the Wesleyan Mission. With unwearied
patience the little party built their premises and
began to teach the natives ; the women were in-
structed in the art of sewing, the children were taught
to read, and the men to till the ground. In return
these people were most ungrateful, the meat was often
stolen from the fire while being cooked, the Mission
premises were invaded and robbed, and those who had
literally given themselves for these heathen were in-
sulted and abused. In their tribal fights they stormed
the Mission house, flung down Mr. Leigh, and tried to
kill them all. But God mercifully preserved their
lives, while the Gospel was faithfully and not alto-
gether unsuccessfully preached. Some sort of order
had been restored and the work established, when Mr.
Marsden, as has been seen, called and took away
Mr. and Mrs. Leigh for a little rest, in which journey
they suffered shipwreck.

When, therefore, Marsden was on the point of
starting for his fifth journey, he had hoped to find these
devoted servants of the Lord doing well at Wangaroa.
But in the meantime troubles had arisen. One day
while the Mission family had gathered for prayers as
usual, a messenger rushed in with the evil tidings that
Hongi, the chief, otherwise known as Shunghai, the
same who had visited England, was approaching
with an army of warriors. Before they could gather

56 AMONG THE MAORIS.

anything together for flight, twenty savages entered ;
and with their wives and children and a few faithful
Christian natives, the terrified missionaries hurried
away. Their retreat to Keri Keri, the station of the
Church Missionary Society, was fraught with perils ;
but, arriving safely there, they took ship to Sydney.
The Mission premises at Wangaroa were utterly
wrecked, plundered and destroyed, and the work of
years of patient labour was apparently in vain.

On hearing of the disaster, Marsden hurried to the
scene, if possible to arrest further trouble. In the
Rainbow he arrived at the Bay of Islands on the 5th
of April, 1827, and immediately called the chiefs
together and pointed out the consequences of Hongi's
conduct. By this time, however, the cyclone of devas-
tation had spent itself, and Hongi's death had given
the opportunity to some friendly chief to invite the
missionaries to return. This they did in 1828, and
after ten years the work was blessed with remarkable
spiritual success, the meeting-places were crowded
with eager worshippers, and other missionaries came
out. One of them, the Rev. J. Whitely, was, however,
killed by a band of warriors while on his way to a
preaching appointment.

The work was beginning to tell, and some of the
converts who had learned English expressed them-
selves in a touching manner in writing to the mission-
aries. A letter from a young man named Wariki
contains the following confessions of spiritual fluctua-
tions : —

" How is it that I am so deaf to what you say? If
I had listened to your various callings, I should many
times have done the things which God bids us do ;
and should not have obeyed my heart, which is a deaf
and a lying heart, and very joking : and my heart

^

m

"WOUNDED IN THE HOUSE OF HIS FRIENDS." 59

sometimes ridicules me for saying, I wish to believe
right, aind to do right. How is it? How is it?
Sometimes I say Ay, and sometimes the thoughts
within me cause me to say No, to the things of God ;
and then there is a grumbling and a contention within,
whether Ay or No is to be the greatest, or which is
to be overturned. The more I turn my eyes within,
and continue looking, I the more wonder, and think
perhaps I have never prayed, perhaps I have. I have
this day and many days, kneeled down and my mouth
has whispered and said loud prayers, but I wish to
know, and am saying within me, if I have prayed with
my heart. Say you, if I have prayed to God with my
heart, should I say No, and not do His bidding, as
the Bible says we must, and tells us how? And
should I flutter about here like a bird without wings,
or like a beast without legs, or like a fish whose tail
and fins a native man has cut off, if I had love in my
heart towards God ? Oh ! I wish that I was not all
lips and mouth in my prayers to God. I am thinking
that I may be likened to stagnant water, that is not
good, that nobody drinks, and that does not run down
in brooks, upon the banks of which kumera and trees
grow. My heart is all rock, all rock, and no good
thing will grow upon it. The lizard and the snail
run over the rocks, and all evil runs over my heart."

Marsden, however, could not stay more than a few
days, as urgent business called for his return to
Sydney ; but in 1830 he took ship again and landed on
the shore of New Zealand, the Rev. Henry Williams,
who afterwards became Archdeacon, being his com-
panion. Immediately they reached the Mission station
they held a council with the brethren about the posi-
tion, which at that moment had become critical. The
tribes were at war, Hongi the ambitious chief being

6o AMONC THE MAORIS.

dead, and the whole nation was absorbed in civil war.
Only a day or two before the arrival of Marsden a
battle had been fought on the opposite shore, and
another was imminent, which might probably be dis-
astrous to the Mission, as the triumphant party were
bitterly opposed to the English. The enemy had
indeed already camped at Kcri-Keri, and not a
moment was to be lost.

Mr. Marsden with Mr. Williams at once crossed
the bay, and summoned the rival chiefs together for
mediation and peace. The gathering was a remark-
able one, the chiefs on both sides, who paid great
respect to Mr. Marsden, " the friend of the Maoris,"
made orations, and discussed the question of satis-
faction from early morning till the shades of night
began to fall. Finally they appointed two commis-
sioners to go with the white men and arrange the
terms of peace.

In the meantime the two missionaries visited the
battle-ground, with its horrible scene of un buried
corpses, and this awful sight had a strong effect on
their minds. But these terrible scenes of carnage,
the seamy side of what men call " glorious war," and
the noise of desperate men clamouring for fight, were
exchanged by Marsden and his companion for the
quiet sanctity of the little mission station, where on
the Sabbath morning the Christian natives had
gathered to praise the Prince of Peace. In one of
his letters Marsden gives a graphic picture of the
scene : — " The contrast between the state of the east
and west side of the bay was very striking. Though
only two miles distant, the east shore was crowded
with different tribes of fighting men in a wild savage
state, many of them nearly naked, and when exercis-
ing entirely naked ; nothing was to be heard but the

"WOUNDED IN THE HOUSE OF HIS FRIENDS." 63

firing of muskets, the noise, din, and commotion of a
savage military camp ; some mourning the death of
their friends, others suffering from their wounds, and
not one but whose mind was involved in heathen
darkness, without one ray of Divine knowledge. On
the other side was the pleasant sound of the church
bell ; the natives assembling together for Divine
worship, clean, orderly, and decently dressed, most of
them in European clothing ; they were carrying the
litany and the greatest part of the Church service,
written in their own language, in their hands with
their hymns. The Church service, as far as it has
been translated, they can read and write. Here
might be viewed at one glance the blessings of the
Christian religion, and the miseries of heathenism
with respect to the present life ; but when we extend
one thought over the eternal world how infinite is the
difference."

This picture of tranquility was, however, to last for
a brief time. A day or two afterwards, the movement
of armed men on the opposite shore was seen, and a
chief woke up Marsden to come and help to make
peace. When he reached the shore the extraordinary
activity of the troops showed that a war was imminent ;
the water was studded with canoes filled with men in
battle array, in some cases the head of one of their
slain chiefs being fixed at the prow to incite them to
vengeance. The yelling of these savages was fearful,
and the fact that the women and children had been
left on the island showed that the passion for blood
had been thoroughly aroused.

Marsden, however, had not a dream of misgiving,
his duty was clear ; at any cost it must be performed,
and launching the mission boat he sailed right into
the midst of the combatants. The three men who

64 AMONG THE MAORIS.

had been appointed as commissionei's a few days
before paddled in their boat in the rear, and when
they reached the beach they placed themselves between
the missionaries and the warriors. " If wc are killed,"
said they to Marsden, "you will be given up to our
friends as a sacrifice for the loss of our lives."

It was a critical moment, and the lives of the
missionaries hung in the balance. A great council of
stormy orations was forthwith held, at the end of
which the great chief took a stick and cut it into
pieces to show that his anger was broken and satis-
fied. A roar of wild yelling attended the ratification
of the peace, and the two armies having through their
chiefs rubbed noses as a token of friendship, danced
together with hideous antics and harmless firing of
their guns. Marsden having succeeded in his mission
as mediator steered once more across the bay, and in
the quiet of his hut wrote : — ■

" The time will come when human sacrifices and
cannibalism shall be annihilated in New Zealand by
the pure, mild, and heavenly influence of the Gospel
of our blessed Lord and Saviour. The work is great,
but Divine goodness will find both the means and the
instruments to accomplish His own gracious purposes
to fallen man. His Word, which is the sword of the
Spirit, is able to subdue these savage people to the
obedience of faith. It is the duty of Christians to
use the means to sow the seed, and patiently to wait
for the heavenly dews to cause it to spring up, and
afterwards to look up to God in faith and prayer to
send the early and latter rain."

CHAPTER V.

THE CROSS EXCHANGED FOR THE CROWN.

B

and

" Thy wonderful grand will, my God,
With triumph will I make it mine ;
And faith shall cry a joyous Yes !
To every dear command of Thine."

E gentle with the missionaries, for they are
gentle with you, do not steal from them, for
they do not steal from you, let them sit at
peace on the ground that they have bought,
let us listen to their advice and come to their
prayers. Though there be many of us, missionaries
and Maoris, let us be all one, all one, all one." These
were the concluding words of a Maori chief who had
been speaking to his fellows about Marsden and his
friends. They indicate what a feeling of confidence
had been implanted in the breasts of these men by the
teaching, and better still the practice of the mission-
aries. It was, indeed, the fair dawning of Christianity
moving over the hills of New Zealand. The storms
had blown over, Hongi and his imperious rule had

65 E

66 AMONG THE MAORIS.

passed, and the land began to feci the blessedness of
peace.

The missions flourished, many converts from the
darkness of heathenism were rejoicing in the light of
Christ and His Gospel, and the little chapels were
crowded with worshippers, who, possessed of a prayer-
book and hymns in their own language, joined in
praise to the Lord.

One of the missionaries tells the following story : —
" During our visits to the sick of Ahiparu, I visited
the hut of a poor cripple, whom I found with a
New Testament lying by his side. I asked him if
he could read, as I saw he had a book. He replied
in the affirmative. I asked, ' How did you learn to
read ? ' seeing he had never attended a school. He
said, ' I used to creep about to pick up (after raking
the rubbish thrown out of my neighbours' houses) all
the bits of printed paper I could find. Sometimes
I got a half leaf of a New Testament, sometimes a bit
of a leaf of a prayer-book. The pieces which I got
from time to time, I used to sew together. Then
came the task to learn to read. This I accomplished
in the following manner : — I pointed to a word, and
asked my brother to tell me its meaning. This I
often did, till I could manage to read a whole verse,
and from that to a chapter. I can now read any
chapter ! ' I next inquired : ' Do you esteem the
Word of God?' He replied, in his expressive
language, ' It is my pillow.'"

The cry was on every hand for missionaries, such
was the general awakening of spiritual interest. The
natives would not fight, they affirmed, if any teacher
were sent to show them the way of life. The Rev.
William Williams (the younger brother of the veteran
Henry Williams), who eventually became Bishop of

THE CROSS EXCHANGED FOR THE CROWN. 6'J

Waiapu, gathered large crowds of natives together,
and after preaching to them was astonished to find
that they could repeat the hymns so correctly ; a
result which was due to their having been carefully
taught in the schools. One of the most cruel and
implacable chiefs, on one occasion, welcomed the
missionaries and professed a great desire to have a
settled teacher. He was, however, a savage at heart,
and when remonstrated with for his fighting raids,
and reminded that he would meet with a violent end,
he insolently exclaimed : " Stop, say not that ! If I
am killed, what matter? If I return, will it not be
well ? " His destructive actions were a serious hind-
rance to the settlement of missions in Ruatera and
Mata Mata, which he governed. In connection with
this ferocious tribe of warriors, an act of heroism is
recorded on the part of the English missionaries.
They had heard how a group of peaceful natives
belonging to the warlike Waharoa's tribe, who were
threatened with death by some warriors who were on
the warpath, intent on an act of vengeance. Directly
the news reached the Mission house, two of the
missionaries, Wilson and Fairburn, calling together a
few Christian natives to lead them, hurried off in the
dead of the night to the rescue. Through dangers of
lurking cannibals below and a flashing storm in the
sky, these brave men crossed the river, wading
through deeps of thick mud, and at last just reached
the imperilled men. The affrighted flax workers
flung down their bundles, and had just time to obey
the warning by hiding in the long grass and silently
swimming the river when the savage horde came up
yelling and brandishing their weapons. Koinaki,
the chief, rushed in, tomahawk uplifted to kill them.
He was staggered to see before him the white

68 AMONG THE MAORIS.

missionary, unarmed and perfectly cool, and dared
not strike. Abashed by the bravery of Mr. Wilson,
the crowd of savages stood in perfect silence for two
hours, afraid to attack. The rain was pouring in
torrents, and savages and missionaries had sheltered
under the same hut, when, presently, amid the hushed
stillness, a prayer rose from the white men, and then
a hymn, in which the Christian natives joined : —

" E Ihu homei e koe
He ngakau honi ki au."

(•' O Jesus ! give to me
A heart made new by Thee.")

The effect was magical. Fierce, passionate hatred
no longer filled the hearts of the warriors ; they were
astonished and confounded. Koinaki, the chief, felt
the sweet influence which the Christian teachers shed
abroad.

" If Waharoa will cease fighting, so will I."

The missionaries wended their way homewards,
fainting often by the way, but glad to have done
their duty as the peacemakers, who are blessed, " for
they shall be called the children of God."

The persecution to which the missionaries were
still subject only proved a testing time to the Maoris,
who were as babes in the faith, and showed the reality
of their new nature.

Few spectacles in the history of missions are as
encouraging as the sight of these chiefs, one by one
giving their hearts to God, and turning their back
upon the old practices and cruelties. One of the
most violent and bloodthirsty of these was Taiwhanga,
who after his conversion asked for Christian baptism.
The missionary's wife in a letter at that time wrote:
" When I saw Taiwhanga advancing from the other
end of our crowded chapel with firm step and subdued

THE CROSS EXCHANGED FOR THE CROWN. 69

countenance, an object of interest to every native as
well as to every English eye, and meekly kneel where
six months before he had at his own request stood
sponsor for his five little children, I deeply felt that
it was the Lord's own doing."

In 1835 the veteran missionary who had borne so
long the heat and weariness of the work received a
severe shock in the death of his wife. Mrs. Marsden
had gone out with him a young wife to share the
perils of his first voyage, and now after a long wedded
life of sacred and happy companionship she passed to
her rest. Marsden was not altogether unprepared
for this sad occurrence ; her health had been failing
for some time, and he had prepared a comfortable
parsonage house in which the survivor of them, which-
ever it should be, would be able to spend the even-
ing of life. He was himself over seventy years of age,
and his work had told upon him ; and now that his
" dear partner," as he was wont to call her, had left
his side, he began almost unconsciously to prepare
for and talk about his own speedy departure to the
land of peace. He used to point to a tree not far
from his house, which had been stripped of all its
companions of the wood, and, exposed to the fury of
the storm and alone, it seemed, as he thought, a fit
emblem of himself. But though at times his spirit
was bowed by these depressing thoughts, he quickly
rose again to the emergencies of the present, and when
he saw the continued and unredressed wrongs of the
natives of his colony his soul was stirred within him.

A deliberate attempt had been made to extermin-
ate the aborigines, and cruelties, which happily would
be almost impossible to-day, were committed by the
settlers upon these degraded and defenceless people.
It would answer no end to recapitulate these crimes

70 AMONG THE MAORIS.

against humanity, or to speak at any length of the
desolating wars which the white men waged against
the " blacks," as they were then called, and who were
remorselessly slain. In vain Marsden raised his
voice against this ; he was in a minority on the side
of the justice of God, and when in the courts he
begged that the natives' evidence might be received,
it was repudiated by the legislature. Turning his
back upon all this turmoil and discouragement,
Marsden looked again across the shimmery sea and
made up his mind that, old and infirm as he was, he
would make a seventh and last missionary journey to
New Zealand, where his heart la3^ He took his
daughter with him, and his biographers are indebted
to this lady's journals for much information about
these his latter days.

On arriving in the country, they were of course
received with acclamations of joy, both by the
missionaries and the natives everywhere. A terrible
fight had just occurred between the Maoris and the
English, through the rash conduct of one of the
European captives. Had Marsden been near the
scene, no doubt he would have interceded success-
fully ; as it was, a very bitter feeling of resentment
had been engendered on both sides. But this did
not affect in any way their love for one whom they
called the friend and father of their country. The
Maoris welcomed him and showed him, amid his
growing infirmities, the tenderest care. His daughter
speaks in her journal of the pleasure they experi-
enced in seeing the Mission so prosperous and the
people so kind.

"We anchored near the Wesleyan Mission station,
where we were kindly welcomed by Mr. and Mrs.
Turner. The Mission here (Hokianga) has been

THE CROSS EXCHANGED FOR THE CROWN. 7 1

established nearly nine years ; they have a neat chapel
and one or two comfortable houses, and are about to
form an additional station. The missionaries related
several instances of the melancholy death of various
New Zealanders who have opposed the progress of the
Mission. One chief became so incensed against the
' Atua ' (that is, God), for the death of his child, that
he formed a circle of gunpowder, placed himself in the
centre and fired. The explosion did not immediately
destroy him ; he lingered a few weeks in dreadful
agony and then died.

"The natives are coming in great numbers to attend
Divine worship. Mr. Turner preached, and after-
wards my father addressed them. They listened with
earnest attention, and were much pleased. Many of
the old chiefs were delighted to see my father, and
offered to build him a house if he would remain.
One said : ' Stay with us, and learn our language, and
then you will become our father and our friend, and
we will build you a house.' ' No,' replied another,
' we cannot build a house good enough ; but we will
hire Europeans to do it for us.'

" The whole congregation joined in the responses
and singing, and though they have not the most
pleasing voices, yet it was delightful to hear them
sing one of the hymns commencing, ' From Egypt
lately come.'

" Took leave of Mrs. Turner, and, mounted in a
chair on the shoulders of two New Zealanders, I
headed the procession. My father, Mr. Wilkinson,
and the two children, were carried in ' kaw-shores,' or
native biers, on which they carry their sick. We
entered a forest of five miles, then stopped to dine.
The natives soon cooked their potatoes, corn, etc. in
their ovens, which they scoop in the sand, and, after

72 AMONG THE MAORIS.

heating a number of stones, the potatoes are put in,
co\ercd with grass and leaves, and a quantity of
water poured upon them ; they were exquisitely
steamed. As I approached one of the groups sitting
at dinner, I was much affected by seeing one of them
get up and ask a blessing over the basket of potatoes.

" Five miles from Waimate I left my chair,
mounted on horseback, and reached Waimate for
breakfast. Old Nini accompanied us the whole way,
and told my father if he attempted to ride he would
leave him. The natives carried him the whole way
with the greatest cheerfulness, and brought him
through the most difficult places with the greatest
ease. The distance they carried him was about
tw^enty miles."

Miss Marsden gives us other peeps at these inter-
esting incidents, and shows us that wherever her
father appeared the natives came forth to meet him
with firing of muskets and dances of exultation. One
old Maori chief sat on the ground before him, and,
in perfect silence, looked for hours into the face of
the venerable missionary ; some one reproved him
for taking such a liberty, but he broke out into the
pathetic remonstrance : " Let me alone, let me take a
last look, I shall never see him again." As Marsden sat
there in his chair under the blue expanse of heaven,
the thousands of Maoris clustering respectfully about
him, it formed a striking and suggestive scene.

When at last he had to go, and the ship stood off
the shore waiting for him., his farewells to his friends
were most affecting. "Like Paul at Miletus," said
an eye-witness, " he parted with many benedic-
tions, sorrowing most of all that we should see his
face again no more. I\Iany could not bid him
adieu. The parting was wdth many tears." On his

SAMUEL MARSDEX.
73

THE CROSS EXCHANGED FOR THE CROWN. 75

way back, the old man talked about his dear wife,
who would not this time be there to meet him on his
return. He told his friends how for more than forty
years they had pilgrimaged together, and he missed
her more and more every day. Some one suggested
that they would not long be separated now. " God
grant it," he exclaimed, looking up at the moon-lit
sky : —

" Prepare me, Lord, for Thy right hand,
Then come the joyful day."'

He reached Sydney, and began again to go forth
among the wild and lawless people of the bush,
speaking of the Christ who is a Saviour from sin.
He had not a particle of fear, and rebuked the sinner
without hesitation. One day, when driving in a
lonely place in the bush, two desperate ruffians,
members of a gang of robbers who had long been the
terror of the colony, stopped the gig, and holding a
pistol at his breast, and another at his daughter,
threatened to shoot them if money were not given.
The aged man was not in the least dismayed, talked
to them of the judgments of God, and warned them
that unless they repented, he would meet them again
on the gallows. This prophecy was, alas, too true,
for some time afterwards he attended them as
chaplain at their execution for capital offences.

He had brought with him from New Zealand some
native youths who delighted themselves in his house
and company. A lady friend writing about these
visitors, says : —

" They delighted to come to our barrack apartments
with him, always making their way to the bookcase
first, take out a book and point upwards, as if every-
body who had anything to do with 'Matua' must
have all their books leading to heaven. Pictures

^6 AMONG THE MAORIS.

pleased them next, when they would direct each
other's attention to what they considered worthy of
notice, with extraordinary intelligence ; but when the
boiled rice and sweets made their appearance,, they dug
their elbows into each other's sides, with gesticulations
of all sorts, and knowing looks, putting their fingers
to their mouths, and laughing with greedy joy, Mr.
Marsdcn all the time watching their movements and
expressive faces as a kind nurse would the gambols
and frolics of her playful charge, with restrained but
grateful emotion."

When the first Bishop of Sydney, Dr. Broughton,
was appointed, some surprise was naturally felt that
Marsden had not been selected, but he would not
allow his friends to regret what appeared to them to
be a slight. " It is better as it is," said the venerable
saint, " I am an old man ; my work is almost done."

And when in the presence of a large concourse he
stood, the tears flowing down his cheeks, and stretched
forth his hands to bless him to whom he said he
" yielded up the keys of a most precious charge," he
could say, with much feeling, " Lord, now lettest Thou
Thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen
Thy salvation."

Soon afterwards the end came. He had contracted
a cold while on a journey of twenty-five miles in his
gig, and in the fever which supervened, his mind
wandered back to his beloved New Zealand and the
Maoris he loved. During a few moments of con-
sciousness he heard some one speak of the value
of a good hope in Christ. " Yes, that hope is indeed
precious to me now." And, with the words " precious,
precious," upon his lips, he passed where the worker
meets the Master, and the weary find sweet rest.

^'-

CHAPTER VI.

THE SUPERSTITIONS AND WORSHIP OF THE MAORIS.

" Long have we roamed in want and pain,
Long have we sought our rest in vain ;
'Wildered in doubt, in darkness lost,
Long have our souls been tempest-tost,
Low at Thy feet our sins we lay :
Turn not, O Lord, Thy guests away."

"TTTHEN the missionaries first went to New
\/\/ Zealand they were struck with the unusual
* » prevalence of "tapu," or the making and
holding of things sacred, which indeed under-
lies all the religious ideas of the Maoris. This law,
which also exists among the islands of Polynesia,
was the code of life to these New Zealanders. Its
origin is enveloped in mystery ; the Maori word
" tapu " is sacred ; " tabiit " is a Malay word to
express " the Ark of the covenant of God ; "
" tabooh " is a Hindoo word for a bier or coffin ;
and, in the ancient Sanscrit, " ta " means to mark,
and " pu " to purify. The use of tapu was not always
in a religious sense ; it was often political, and might

77

yS AMONG THE MAORIS.

be practised for either saving life or destroying it.
Certain persons or things were invariably held sacred
by it — the bodies of chiefs, the first sweet potatoes,
the men engaged in planting them, sick persons,
fishing nets, sticks upon which the priests keep their
ancestral records ; and, for temporary purposes, the
same law applied to trees likely to make good canoes,
to places where birds lay their eggs, and generally
everything which relates to the priest. The act of
rendering a thing or place tapu was very simple :
the priest had simply to touch or point to a thing,
or, in some cases, to tie a piece of human hair or
a bit of an old mat to the object.

Chiefs and priests were, by virtue of their office,
tapu, and therefore not allowed to work, but were fed
by their slaves. If, however, a man was tapu, and
had no slave to perform these offices, he was com-
pelled to go upon his hands and knees, and eat the
food from the ground like a dog. Perhaps in nothing
is the sacredness of this practice shown more than in
dealing with the dead. The place of departure is so
sacred that everything on the spot is destroyed by
fire ; this requirement, however, they meet by taking
their dying persons to the side of a stream, or covering
them with a slight shelter, the destruction of which
will not interfere with the value of their property.
To break the tapu was punishable with death, and
most of the wars between the tribes arose from some
difficulties of that character.

To remove the spell the tapued persons had to
undergo an elaborate ceremony. A consecrated stick
of wood was passed over the right shoulder, round
the body, and back to the left shoulder ; then broken
in two or flung into the sea. After that, the priest
would stand over these persons waving branches

SUPERSTITIONS AND WORSHIP OF THE MAORIS. 79

of the korokio tree, and chant some such dirge as
this :—

" Oh, fearful and dreaded tapu, get you hence.
Now thou art being put down and out of the way ;
Go to the streams and wade through them,
These are the waters which the sun has to cross so that he
may be free."

Then the priest says to the people, " The tapu is
here, the tapu is removed to a distant place, that
tapu which held thee. Take away the dread, take
away the fear, the tapu is being borne away, and the
tapued person is free."

It may be said that this system is an unseen net-
work of fear and misery to the native mind, and
ensnares the heart of the people in the meshes of
perpetual bondage and trouble.

In some respects the religions of the Maoris may
be considered no religion at all. They have no con-
ception of a Supreme Being, no place of worship, no
special dress or marks of priesthood, and few sacrifices.
The traditional creed embodying the story of creation
is very strange and worth quoting : —

" In the beginning was the ' Night,'

The ' Night ' begot the ' Light,'

The ' Light ' begot the ' Light standing long,'

The 'Light long standing' begot ' Nothingness,'

The ' Nothingness ' begot ' Nothingness the pos-
sessed,'

The ' Nothingness the possessed ' begot ' Nothing-
ness the made excellent,'

The ' Nothingness the made excellent ' begot
' Nothingness the fast bound,'

The ' Nothingness the fast bound ' begot ' Nothing-
ness the first,'

The ' Nothingness the first ' begot ' Moisture,'

8o AMONG THE MAORIS.

' Moisture ' married ' the Strait, the vast, the clear,'

And their progeny were Rangi the heaven, and
Papa the earth."

Afterwards, they believe, the children of these two
quarrelled and tore their parents asunder, Rangi or
heaven going upwards and Papa or the earth down-
wards ; but though separate, they still maintain their
natural love for each other. The earth, say they,
sends her love up in mists at evening, and heaven,
mourning for her beloved earth, sends down tear drops
which men call dew.

These unnatural brethren are the gods of the Maoris,
who do not, however, practise idolatry, no idols such
as are found in other countries being amongst them.
They believe that their principal chiefs become deified
men, and to them the various tribes pray and offer
worship. They hold the doctrine of transmigration
of souls, and like the Hindoo imagine their ancestors
in the bodies of lizards, birds, spiders, and rats.
Beside this, they believe in the existence of a multi-
tude of invisible spirits called Patupaiarche, and are
haunted with spiritualistic fears and imaginings.
Like the poor Singalese they never go out after dark
without a terrible dread of these evil agencies who
lurk under the trees, and fly in the night air. It is
said that in misty weather these beings allow them-
selves to be seen, and when not bent on the torment
or destruction of mankind they are represented as
sitting on the tops of the mountains singing and
playing on flutes. It is a curious tradition that these
fairies or demons taught the ]\Iaoris the art of fishing
and weaving nets.

Unlike the North American Indians and other
native races, the Maoris do not appear to have any
adequate conception of a Good Spirit, the only super-

SUPERSTITIONS AND WORSHIP OF THE MAORIS. 8 1

natural person whom they revere being ]\Ia\ve, the
author and originator of their country. The tradition
of this m5'sterious and all-powerful personality is thus
told in the myths of the Maori, as related by the old
men.

" ]\Iawe dwelt upon a barren rock in the middle
of the sea, supposed to exist somewhere northward
of the ' Three Kings ; ' his wife Hina, and his brother
Taki, were his only companions. He had two sons,
both of whom he slew when they were }-oung men,
that he might make fish-hooks of their jaw-bones.
The right e}-e of each he afterwards placed in the
heavens ; making one the morning star, and the other
the evening star. So great was the strength of Mawe,
that he could draw up the largest whales, and take
them with ease on shore.

"While fishing one day, with the jaw-bone of his
eldest son for a hook, and a piece of his own ear for a
bait, he fastened on something exceedingly heavy,
which he found to be land. He was three months in
hauling it up above the water ; and would not then have
succeeded, had he not caught a dove, put his spirit
into it, tied the line to which the land was fastened
to its beak, and then caused the dove to fly to the
clouds, and draw up the islands above the surface of
the water. This sacred dove, at times, appears en-
dowed with ]\Iawe's spirit ; and coos in the night,
presaging a storm, or some terrible calamity to those
who hear it. When New Zealand was raised from
the depths of the ocean, Mawe went on shore, where
he found many things to astonish him — men and fire ;
neither of which he had ever seen before. He took
some fire in his hands, not knowing the torture it
would create ; but when he felt the pain, he ran with
the fire in his hands, and jumped into the sea : he

F

82 AMONG THE MAORIS.

came up, bearing Sulphur or White Island (a burning
island, called Puhiawa-kari, in the Bay of Plenty) on
his shoulders ; to which he set fire, and which has
continued ever since to burn.

" When he sank in the waters, the sun for the first
time set, and darkness covered the earth. As soon as
he found that all was night, he immediately pursued
the sun, and brought him back again in the morning,
but had no power to keep him from running away
again and causing night. Mawe, however, tied a string
to the sun and fastened it to the moon, that as the
former went down, the other, being pulled after it by
the superior power of the sun, may rise and give
Mawe light during his absence. But the men of New
Zealand offended him, and as he could not darken
the sun to punish them, nor hide the moon for ever,
he placed his hand between it and the earth at stated
seasons, that they might not enjoy the light which it
was intended to give. Mawe also holds all the winds,
except the west wind, in his hands, or places in caves
that they may not blow. He could not catch the
west wind, nor discover its cave, to roll a stone against
it ; consequently he has no power over that wind to
prevent it from almost constantly exerting itself.
When the westerly breeze dies away, it is supposed
that Mawe has nearly overtaken it, and that it has
hid itself in its cave till he has passed by or given up
the chase. And when the north, south, or east wind
blows, it is supposed that the enemies of Mawe have
rolled away the stone from the mouth of the cave
where these winds are confined, or that he himself
has let them loose to punish the world, or to ride
upon their wings in search of the westerly breeze.
This latter is only supposed to be the case when the
storm arises in the east, and veers about from south-

14-V
^

SUPERSTITIONS AND WORSHIP OF THE MAORIS. 85

east to north-east. The form of Mawe is that of a
man, except the eyes, one of which is an eel, and the
other a piece of the green talc found in Te-wai-
ponamu, or the Southward Island."

The Maoris have, however, very clear ideas of the
evil spirit called Wiro, from whose malevolent person
all sin and trouble come. They say like us that he
is the father of lies, that he urges men and women to
commit all crimes, that he is the embodiment of
cruelty, laughing at the sight of weeping men, rejoic-
ing when they are bowed with trouble ; and that he
who has taught the Maori to eat each other himself
feeds on the souls of men. He is omnipresent, and
awfully haunts them everywhere, crouching on their
pillows when they go to sleep, perching on the stern
of their canoes when they go to fish, and coming the
unasked, and certainly the most unwelcome, guest
into their circles of sacred or social life. Thus it will
be seen that they were, when the missionaries first
came to their shores, a demon-ridden people.

All this, of course, makes the priest a necessity, and
among the Maoris this personage assumes the usual
importance and prerogatives. The office is hereditary,
and its members are generally of chieftain status. But
the people are not so strict in this respect as some
native races, and it often falls to the lot of the
youngest son of a chief to become the priest, and he
may soon degenerate into a mere sorcerer viewed
with slight respect. Having the power to consult the
oracles of the gods, they gain or lose their reputation
according to the success of their prophecies, and,
therefore, with much worldly wisdom take every
possible precaution and wait as long as possible that
they may be correct. They give their advice upon
the mysterious appearance of common objects, such

86 AMONG THE MAORIS.

as a flight of birds in some particular direction, the
quantity or shape of the earth adhering to a fern root ;
and in order to intensify the effect of their prophecy
they fall into trances, at the same time terrifying the
bystanders with unearthly words and chants.

One special instrument of cunning they use with
great success, the power of imitating voices ; they are
accomplished ventriloquists, and bewitch their votaries
with these arts. In almost every case the lizard is
the embodiment of evil and suffering ; if the evil eye
is cast upon a man he grows dejected, and is told that
a baleful spirit in the form of a lizard is slowly killing
him. The method of consulting an oracle is as
follows : — A spot of ground is selected sheltered from
the wind and the fern ; weeds and other vegetation
are cleared therefrom for the space of about six feet.
If the question to be decided is the issue of a war, the
wizard takes a number of sticks of equal size, and
while the air is perfectly calm he makes these stand
on end in two rows to represent the respective armies;
then he names them.

" This is the N'gai-te-waki, that the N'ga-ti-rahairi ;
this is the Uri-Rapana, and this the Nga-te-tau-tahi."
He retires to a distance and watches the effect of the
rising wind ; those which fall back are defeated, if
sideways only partially destroyed, if forward theirs is
the victory. It will be readily seen, however, that this
arrangement lends itself to all sorts of trickery, and
the manipulator generally manages to give an oracle
favourable to the tribe asking his advice. The sticks
are in every case carried with the tribe to battle, and
conceived to be a sacred pledge of victory.

Such are some of the dark and heathenish practices
of the Maoris in their unenlightened state. Happily
for New Zealand :

SUPERSTITIONS AND WORSHIP OF THE MAORIS. 87

" The old order changeth, giving
place unto the new."

And the superstitions of the natives are becoming more
and more a miserable memory. But in those early
days of missionary effort the prince of darkness strove,
in many cases not unsuccessfully, with the growing
light of the Gospel for the souls of men. An illustra-
tion of this is given by the Rev. William Yate, a
missionary of great intelligence and devotion, in his
journal, and this most interesting account will fitly
close this present chapter.

" Paru, a chief of much influence and authority
amongst the tribe N'gai-te-waki, was a man of a bold
and daring spirit, savage in his disposition, and reck-
less of the consequences of any of his actions, either
to himself or others. He always had the appearance
of a man verging on consumption ; and his tendency
to this disorder was much increased by his having
been exposed to severe cold and wet, in a predatory
excursion to the southward. The excursion, in which
Paru formed one of the party, was undertaken in the
winter, some of those engaged in it were drowned,
others were starved to death by cold and hunger ;
and the greater portion who lived to return home had
laid the foundation of diseases which rendered their
future da}'s miserable, or brought them to an untimely
grave. The young man of whom I am now speaking
began visibly to decline in the spring of the year
1 829 ; and a very short time proved that his disease
was too deeply fixed to be eradicated. He could
scarcely ever be prevailed upon to take medicines ;
never, indeed, except at the earnest persuasion of one
of the missionaries. He placed his whole confidence
for his recovery in the superstitious rites of the priests,
whose tapus and other observances and requirements.

88 AMONG THE MAORIS.

in the end, greatly hastened his death. He had heard
many times of the truths of our holy religion ; and
had been entreated again and again, while in com-
parative health, to lay hold of the hope of everlasting
life set before him in the Gospel, but he rejected every
overture of mercy. I visited him several times during
his illness, and took with me many little comforts
which he had no opportunity of procuring. I always
found him stretched on a bed of fern, under a miser-
able shed that could not screen him from the scorching
rays of the midday sun ; nor from the cold, raw air
of midnight ; nor yet from wind and rain. Here he
lay, the picture of despair, an old, tapued woman at
his side, wiping, with a roll of flax, the sweat that
streamed down his fleshless, tattooed face ; and a
whole host of friends, at a little distance, talking
loudly, and with seeming gladness, at the prospect of
the removal of him who lay before them. Their
conversation was of the most unfeeling character ;
such as, where he should be buried, how many muskets
or blankets should be buried with him : how they
would act at the final removal of his bones ; and the
probable size of the coffins he would require at his
first burial, and after his exhumation. On my visit
to him, the day of his death, I found the usual noisy
company, and the above were the common topics of
conversation in which these ' miserable comforters '
engaged. I spoke to them of the cruelty of such
conduct, but they laughed at the idea. I then turned
to the forlorn patient, and found him struggling hard
for breath, whilst the sweat of death was upon him.
He retained the full use of his senses to the last ; but
this was to him, emphatically, the valley of the
shadow of death. I spoke to him of a Saviour, able
and willing to save him even then, if he would only

SUPERSTITIONS AND WORSHIP OF THE MAORIS. 89

call upon Him for salvation, but he grew angry ; the
expression of his countenance was changed, and he
told me, that ' from his birth he had lived a native
man, and a native man he would die.' He became
more calm when I asked him where he expected his
spirit would go after death ; and, whether he thought
he should be happy or miserable in the world which
is to come. The doctrine of a future existence is one
in which all the New Zealanders most firmly believe,
but their ideas respecting it are most absurd. The
answer which I received from Paru to this important
question was rather a lengthy one, they were the last
words he ever spoke — the last earthly sounds he ever
uttered, except the long, deep, hollow groan of death.
' I shall go to hell,' said he, with terrible emphasis ;
' I shall go to hell. Wiro is there, and I shall be his
companion for ever. I have not killed men enough
to have my eyes made stars, as Hongi's are. I am
not an old man, but a youth, I shall go to hell : where
else — where else — where else should I go ? ' He sank
down exhausted, and seemed to slumber for a short
time ; so I left him, and before I had ridden half-a-
mile from the place where he was lying, a long fire
of musketry announced his departure to that place
where his state is for ever fixed. Thus died Paru, a
chief of great name and importance with the N'gai-te-
waki. I dare not pronounce what his state now is ;
man is not the judge. He has passed the tribunal of
the Judge of quick and dead, who must needs do
right, and will render to every man according to his
deeds. This only, as far as it appeared to us, we
know, that poor Paru, to the very last, turned his back
upon the only way of salvation."

CHAPTER VII.

SOME OF THE SHEAVES.

" How happy the man whose heart is set free,
The people that can be joyful in Thee ;
Their joy is to walk in the light of Thy face,
And still they are talking of Jesus' grace."

AFTER the death of Marsden, the responsibility
of continuing missions in New Zealand fell
into the hands of those who had been his
faithful comrades during his later years. He
had laid the foundation, and it was now for them to
complete the glorious structure of Christianity among
the Maoris. One of the most distinguished of his
coadjutors was the Rev. Henry Williams, who seems to
have caught his spirit in dealing with the natives, and
shared more perhaps than any other man the confi-
dence they reposed in IMarsden. This was strikingly
shown in his acts as mediator between the tribes who
were at war from time to time.

Many incidents are preserved showing his good
work in this capacity. They display the heroisms of
the man as well as his consistent enforcement of the
90

SOME OF THE SHEAVES. 91

principles of the Prince of Peace. On one occasion
he went to visit a powerful chief, named Te Koikoi,
and was previously warned not to mention hell as a
place of punishment for the wicked, as the old warrior
would immediately take offence. Waiving such weak
considerations, the missionary at once conversed with
the chief on the subject, and told him how God was
angry with the wicked every day, and had said that
they, and all the nations that forget Him, would be
turned into hell. But he did not seem offended, and
listened while Mr. Williams urged him to flee from
the wrath to come, and accept the offer of mercy,
Christ. Some time afterwards, however, he appeared
before the mission station in a great rage, with an
army of warriors, demanding satisfaction for having
been told that he would go to fire and brimstone.
Mischief would have followed had it not been for the
coolness of the missionary, who reasoned with him,
and refused point blank to give anything as a repara-
tion. After turning away in a great rage, like another
Naaman, the old chief reappeared, followed by all his
people, not armed, however, this time, but carrying a
peaceful offering of food and fruits, which were after-
wards distributed amongst the people.

On another occasion a battle was imminent — the
immediate cause being that a chief had been shot at,
and a proof of the influence of Williams is seen in
that some of the chiefs interested in the struggle
came to him and asked for his intervention. They
began their negotiations on the Saturday, and hearing
from the missionaries that Sunday was a sacred day,
they voluntarily agreed to abstain from all hostilities
on the morrow, and actually sat down together to
hear Williams preach to them of the love of Christ.
Then on the day following Williams walked with the

92 AMONG THE MAORIS.

chief, Tohitapu, carrying a white flag to the enemy's
quarters, and after the long palaver customary with
the Maoris, the armies were disbanded and peace
proclaimed. Afterwards one of the old chiefs came
to the mission station and declared that he must
cither kill some one or hang himself Holding up his
hatchet, he cried : —

" Sixteen persons by this have been sent to the
shades below, and unless I can kill and eat some one
now, I shall have no rest."

Mr. Williams laid his hand gently on him and
rebuked him for such a desire, which reproof the
old man duly appreciated, for he changed his mind
suddenly, and, flinging away the hatchet, said, " I will
use it no more."

Amid many discouragements it was very helpful to
the missionaries to notice the faithful lives of their
converts, and how peacefully they passed away. One
of their native girls, named Peti, had been taken into
the mission house as a servant, and soon became wise
unto salvation. After her baptism she was taken ill
with consumption, and, while lying very weak, her
constant care was the salvation of her two friends
who watched her bed. " O Tuarri, Tuarri ! " she
would cry, "it will not be long before I leave you,
and why do you not believe? Do you think that
God will not listen to your prayers ? Yes, He will
listen to all who pray to Him from their hearts. He
is not like the Maoris, He does not bear malice
towards unbelievers. His love is great, it is not like
the love of the world which soon dies away, but it
lasts for ever." Then again, a few days afterwards,
she appealed to her other friend: "Rama, you say
you believe, but your works do not correspond with
your profession. Do pray often and earnestly that

SOME OF THE SHEAVES. 93

God may preserve you when you arc tempted. Mind,
you cannot deceive God. No, He can see everything,
and knows everything."

Her dying was full of triumph. Speaking of her
sufferings she said, " My pain is great, but it is
nothing to what my Saviour suffered. I feel happy.
I am not afraid. Christ is waiting at the end of the
road. I want to go." The missionary's daughter
stooped down and kissed her, " Farewell Peti, you
are now going to Jesus," she said. Her whispered
reply was " Yes, I am happy, I am happy," and
passed away.

Mr. Davis, one of the missionaries, one day after
preaching, noticed an old man lying on the verandah
of a house on his mattress evidently very ill. When
he drew near and spoke to him, he made no sign, his
eyes were fixed and glazed, and in a few minutes he
would be dead. Presently his power of speech re-
turned, and looking intently at the missionary, he said,
" My mind is fixed on Christ as my Saviour."

" How long have you been seeking Christ ? " asked
the missionary.

" From the first," said he. " Christ is in my heart
and my soul is joyful." As his strength began to
finally give out his last words were, " I have no fear,
Christ is with me."

In the year 1835 a mission station was established
at Mata Mata, under the care of the Rev. A. N. Brown,
who soon found that difficulties would arise with the
chief Paharakeke, who had engaged to build the
premises. He began to extort money and to hinder
the work by keeping the natives away. It was only
by the intervention of the old friendly chief Ngakuku
that matters were arranged, and instead of the usual
rubbing of mutual noses, the missionary and Pahara-

94 AMONG THE MAORIS.

kckc shook hands English fashion. But the constant
conflicts between the local tribes was a standing
menace to their success. Mr. Chapman, another
missionary, had started work at Rotorua, and some
progress had been made in influencing the natives by
the Gospel. Suddenly an act of treachery on the
part of the people near his mission spread the sky
with clouds of alarm and danger. The cause Mr.
Chapman relates in a letter : —

"We were just beginning to feel some little ease
from the burdens which for four months had pressed
heavily upon us, when on Christmas morning of 1835,
just as I was preparing to assemble the natives for
service, intelligence was brought me that a chief
named Huka had that morning murdered, in a most
barbarous manner, Hunga, a near relative of Waharoa,
and that the body had been taken to Huka's Pah, on
the other side of the lake, to be eaten. I immediately
had the boat launched, and, favoured with a fair wind,
landed in little more than an hour. The natives
received me in sullen silence, no doubt guessing my
errand. They made no answer to my inquiries, and
Huka himself, I found, was then at the great Pah,
having gone there as I afterwards learnt, to hang up
the poor man's heart in a sacred place, in order to
avert any danger from himself I called upon them
to give up to me the body of the murdered man ;
upon which a young man rose, and said that they had
not the body, but that it had been quartered, and sent
away in different directions ; that they had the head,
which they were willing to give me, but were afraid of
Huka's anger. I told them that I would take the
responsibility upon myself He then walked a short
distance, and with the utmost unconcern brought me
the head, wrapped up in a bloody mat. Placing it in

SO:\IE OF THE SHEAVES.

95

the boat, I brought it away, and on the following
morning delivered it to some of the poor man's
relations."

When the news came to ]\Iata Mata, W'aharoa, the
warlike chief, determined upon speedy revenge. By an

A NATIVE SERVICE.

unlikely artifice he deceived the Rotorua people, and
suddenly pounced upon the place where lived the
murderer of his tribeman, and while the people were
sleeping he entered the Pah and put sixty-five to

g6 AMONO THE MAORIS.

instant death. The awful slaughter fever was now
possessing the warriors, and in the presence of the
missionaries they practised their inhuman atrocities,
and even threatened the white men with death if
they continued to rebuke their cruelties. At Mata
Mata there was a terror of reprisals, and the work-
was paralysed. The lads and girls of the schools were
placed with the women in the safe hiding of the Pah,
and the approach of the enemy was hourly expected.
The defenders were associated with the Mission, and
when a few days later the Rotorua braves rushed
upon the place and destroyed the men, taking the
women and children as slaves, the work was practically
at an end. The old chief Waharoa was roused with a
thirst for retribution, and seizing his opportunity
attacked the Rotorua warriors, some of whom re-
treated to the mission premises. In the battle which
followed the doors and windows of the house were
broken in and everything pillaged and destroyed. It
was then seen by the missionaries that no mission
property in that neighbourhood could be treated as
secure. Mr. Morgan and Mr. Knight, who were
temporarily in charge at Mata Mata, hastened to reach
the safe borders of Puriri. When, however, they
reached a place on the way some villagers called
upon them to return, as they said several people,
dressed in English clothing, were approaching.
Presently these appeared dressed in white shirts
which they had stolen, and their leader solemnly
conducting them with his head enveloped in an old
black silk bonnet, part of Mrs. Chapman's wardrobe,
and a piece of cotton print, tied round his sable
neck. In the midst of much distress and trouble
this man's appearance could not fail to amuse the
missionaries. They proved to be friendly natives

SOME OF THE SHEAVES. 97

who had received some of the property stolen from
the mission premises.

The Christian chief, Ngakuku, while acting as
guide to an Englishman and his family and his party
of twenty-one natives, passed through a terrible
ordeal, and the spirit in which he bore his trouble
shows how the power of Divine grace can control a
man who in times past has been savage and relent-
less. One night they were surprised by a Rotorua
party, who had mistaken them for Waharoa's soldiers.
With the stealthy, swift action of Maori warfare, they
rushed upon them in the darkness ; every one fled to
the wood, and Ngakuku, snatching up his boy in his
arms, begged his little girl, Tarore, to follow.

This poor child, however, was dazed with sleep,
and did not do so, and at daybreak he sought for her
in vain. Some of the hostile natives came telling
him she was well, and endeavouring to ensnare him
by that strategy ; but, as night came on, he stole
down to the deserted hut, and found her dead.
Carrying the body to the missionaries, he broke out
into lamentations and tears.

" The only reason why my heart is sad," he cried,
" is that I do not know whether my child has gone to
heaven or to the Reiugi. She has heard the Gospel
with her ears, and read it to Mrs. Brown, but I do not
know whether she has received it into her heart."

When at the little chapel evening prayers were
said, the broken-hearted man spoke a few words on
" Let not your heart be troubled : ye believe in God,
believe also in me. In my Father's house are many
mansions ; " and the sweet promises of comfort
seemed to fall like refreshing rain on the parched
spirit of the speaker. The next day the child
received Christian burial, and a large concourse of

G

98 AMONG THE MAORIS.

natives stood round the grave. After the missionary
had spoken, the father came forward, and, amid
impressive silence, said : —

"There lies my child ; she has been murdered as a
payment for your bad conduct. But do not you rise
up to obtain satisfaction for her. God will do that.
Let this be the conclusion of the war with Rotorua.
Let peace be now made. My heart is not sad for my
daughter, but for you. You wished for teachers to
come to you ; they came, and now you are driving
them away. You are weeping for my daughter, but
I am weeping for you, for myself, for all of us.
Perhaps this murder is a sign of God's anger towards
us for our sins. Turn to Him, believe, or you will all
perish."

It is a singular circumstance, that years afterwards,
Uita, the man who led the attack during which the
child was killed, embraced Christianity, and before
his confession and baptism in the native church,
would first find out Ngakuku and receive his for-
giveness.

This beautiful girl, who sealed the faith with her
blood, died like a real martyr. She clasped her Maori
Gospel of St. Luke to her breast, and her murderers,
tearing from it some leaves of the sacred Book, used
them as cartridges when they shot her down. One
of these torn leaves was picked up by a poor slave
boy, who carried it away, and, having been taught in
the mission school to read, set to work among the
very tribe which had committed the crime to spread
the Gospel. Through his instrumentality a mission
was established, at the personal request of the son
of one of the chiefs, and, in 1839, its missionary,
speaking of this poor boy's devoted service, said : —

" He has laboured with astonishing zeal and per-

SOME OF THE SHEAVES. 99

severance. He has taught many to read, and has
instructed numbers, as far as he is able, in the truths
of the Gospel, so that many tribes, from some dis-
tance round, call themselves believers, keep the
Lord's Day, assemble for worship, and use the Litany
of the Church of England. The schools also are
numerous. I felt that one boy, Makahau, had set an
example which might arouse the missionaries to
every exertion, and act as a powerful appeal to the
friends of the Society at home."

After this, who shall despise the day of small
things? Surely in that supreme hour, when the
hearts of all will be revealed, and the stewardship of
all be weighed and judged, this simple Maori youth
will receive the commendation of the Lord he so
faithfully served : " Come, ye blessed of my Father,
inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the
foundation of the world."

For some years this tribal war continued, and in
1839 the inission party, who had been compelled to
leave the district, commenced the work again on the
island of Mokoia in the middle of Rotorua Lake,
where they were safe from the contending forces.
Persecution had knitted the Christians together in
love, and the missionaries were gratified to notice
how the leaven of the Gospel was working in the
hearts of the young men.

The old chief, Waharoa, had come to the end of his
days of battle, and complained bitterly that his sons,
instead of following his warlike example, chose rather
the Christian method of reconciliation with their
enemies. He died without any signs of conversion,
and his favourite son, Tarapipipi, was received into
Christian fellowship, and was baptised under the
name of Wireum Tainhana.

100 AMONG THE MAORIS.

Although popular with the tribe, and accepted
unanimously as the bravest of the brave, his followers
tried by every means to shake his Christian principles,
especially as regards war. Soon afterwards he had
an opportunity of testifying before his people. A
hostile army appeared on his borders, and a council
of war was held, at which the new chief was urged to
show his valour and carry on the military fame of his
father, the warlike Waharoa. It was a critical
moment, and there were many inducements to move
his mind in the direction of their wishes ; but Tain-
hana Tarapipipi rose in the midst of them with his
New Testament in his hand, and with courage and
frankness in his demeanour, witnessed a good confes-
sion, rebuking his headstrong warriors and pointing
out that not by arms but acts of righteousness could
Christians achieve their victories.

His appeal was successful, the attack of the enemy
was averted by friendly consultations, and Tainhana
lived to be a wise and godly governor of his people.

From this time there was a marked improvement
in the work, and the tide of spiritual prosperity had
set in. The missionaries were gladdened by the
desire of the natives to know the truth, and the New
Testament having been translated into Maori, they
were able to bid them read for themselves what God
had to say to them.

But while persecution from the New Zealanders
had ceased, opposition came from quite another
quarter. Some Romish priests, under various dis-
guises, had found their way into the island, and by
liberal presents of blankets and other articles, were
gaining the confidence of the natives. A Romish
bishop made his appearance, and the Protestant
workers, who had borne the heat and burden of the

SOME OF THE SHEAVES. lOI

pioneer work, now foresaw serious troubles ahead.
The natives soon began to confront the new teachers
with the Bible, and they in turn denounced the
missionaries as unauthorised and without the truth.
Nothing could be more lamentable than that there in
New Zealand, just emerging from its darkness of
superstition and sin, the old struggle with the shadow
of Rome had to be renewed in the face of the people.
The missionaries found themselves compelled to with-
stand the arguments brought against their teaching
by the priests. One of the latter drew upon the
ground a diagram of the Roman Empire, and tried to
explain that Peter and Paul went to Rome, and that
there and there only the true Church sprang. Then
the Rev. William Williams pointed out in reply that
the Scriptures were our guide, and when the priest
spoke of councils, the puzzled natives could not
understand.

But they held their Bibles in their hands, and the
priest had been compelled to admit that that was the
Word of God, but that the Protestants had stolen it
from them. Mr. Williams showed that it was like a
stream making its way to the sea ; the priest's copy
of the Bible was but a supply in his vessel, but the
Protestants have fetched theirs from the stream itself.
Suiting his action to the argument, Mr. Williams
seized an empty calabash and filled it at the rushing
rivulet close by, and returning, asked the natives, " Is
this stealing? "

They saw the point at once, and the priest, discom-
fited, retired, leaving many of his adherents to
accept the truth as preached by the Protestant
missionaries.

The Christian natives themselves were not slow to
dispute with these teachers of a strange religion. Mr.

102 AMONG THE MAORIS.

Williams, in his interesting book, " Christianity among
the New Zealanders," gives a striking instance, which
is worth quoting here : —

" At the time when Bishop Fompallier was at Tau-
ranga, in the year 1840, Matin, a Christian native,
who was afterwards appointed a teacher, had a con-
troversy with one of the priests, which is thus
related : — The priest said, ' There is one God, the
Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.' ' That is
true,' replied Matin. The priest then, holding his
crucifix in his hand, remarked, ' We do not worship
this, but it is to make us remember Christ.' ' That,'
replied Matin, ' is what you say ; but what says the
Book ? " Thou shalt not make to thyself any graven
image." Your image is the work of man, and to
make an image like that is breaking God's command-
ment.' Matin then read Revelations xiv. 9, 10, 11,
and asked the priest the meaning of the passage.
The priest replied that he did not know enough of the
native language to understand him, and was walking
away, ' Stop,' said Matin ; ' you sought this conver-
sation with me, and if you cannot understand what
I say, your disciple, Haki Tara, can. I will tell him
what these verses mean, and he can explain it to you.
' Haki,' continued Matin, ' this receiving the mark of
the beast means, among other things, carrying those
medals of the Virgin in your cars, and those crosses
round your necks ; and now, Haki, tell me what this
expression means, " If the blind lead the blind, both
shall fall into the ditch." ' ' I do not know,' replied
Haki. 'Then,' said Matin, 'I will tell you. That
man,' pointing to the priest, ' is the leader of the
blind, and those who listen to his preaching, and
receive his doctrines, and bow down to his images,
are blind also ; and the ditch means hell, into which

SOME OF THE SHEAVES. I03

both parties, unless they repent, will at last fall.'
The priest would not remain any longer, but turned
angrily away, probably more firmly convinced than
ever that the Church of Rome is right in withholding
from the common people that Word which God
designed as a lamp to lead them into all truth."

On another occasion, a Christian native at Rotorua,
who had encountered the Romish bishop at Auck-
land, said that the bishop justified their making
carved images from the example of the carved cheru-
bim and seraphim. The plain, common-sense, scrip-
tural reply of the native to the bishop was striking : —
" God," he said, " commanded the cherubim and
seraphim to be made ; God forbids you to make
carved images. God spoke from the cherubim and
seraphim ; did He ever speak from your images ? "

The remarkable change which had come over the
natives at this time was apparent elsewhere. More
certain perhaps than the statement that so many
thousands had been baptised was the indisputable
evidence that they were living new lives, because in
Christ Jesus they had become new creatures.

The old savage element had passed, and to these
people, who had come out of such darkness, it was
evident that the light of Life had come.

Dr. Sinclair, who had been travelling in New
Zealand for scientific purposes, in a letter on his
return to Glasgow, thus gives his impartial testimony
upon the point : —

" By means of the well-directed labours of the
missionaries, the natives have become exemplary
Christians, and show an intellectual capacity which
strikes with surprise everyone who goes among them.
I might mention many circumstances to prove how
sincere they are, and how well they seem to be

I04 AMONG THE MAORIS.

instructed in religion ; but I will state only one,
which made a deep impression upon me at the time.
While staying for a few days in the hut of an
Englishman, at a part of the coast very little fre-
quented, where about thirty natives live, I heard,
morning after morning, about daybreak, when, as
Captain Cook beautifully observes, the warbling of
the small birds in New Zealand appears like the
tinkling of little bells, the sound of a person striking
an iron bolt. On inquiry, I found this to be the call
to morning prayer, and that on a small spot of
ground, cleared for the purpose, all the little village
assembled beneath the canopy of heaven, to offer up,
in unaffected piety, their grateful thanks and prayers to
their Great Creator. Their avidity to learn reading
and writing, and to possess books, as well as to
engage in discussion on religious and other subjects, is
very remarkable. From what I have seen of those
still unconverted, the state of the whole people, before
the arrival of the missionaries, must have been more
degraded and abject than that of any other nation I
have ever seen, whether on the coasts of Africa, or
the north-west coast of America, the Sandwich
Islands, or any other country which I have visited.
I have observed myself, as well as heard it remarked
by others, the great contrast between the modesty
and good sense shown in the conversation of those
who have been converted, and the ribaldry and
indecency of those who still remain in darkness.
Frequently have I heard a Christian native, when
asked to buy or sell on the Sunday, or break any
other commandment, make the decided answer, ' No,
me missionar;' and that in circumstances when the
temptation was great, and the means of keeping the
transaction secret not difficult."

CHAPTER VIII.

SELWYN, THE FIRST BISHOP.

"Everywhere the gate of beauty

Fresh across the pathway swings,
As we follow truth and duty
All along new glory flings."

THE political history of New Zealand from the
years 1830 to 1840 is full of interest, and if the
subject lay within the sphere of the present
work a chapter or more might be devoted
thereto. Marsden had always at heart the social
welfare of the natives, and his grand idea was that of
a Maori king who should wisely govern his people in
the fear of God. This dream, however, was dissipated
by the disastrous conflicts which raged among the
Maoris themselves, and their instability of character ;
a nation of many masters, it was disunited and incap-
able of self-control. Added to this, the influence of
Europeans upon the people was the reverse of satis-
factory. They were setting the tribes against each
other, and fomenting a spirit of revenge and cruelty
which sadly injured the work of the missions. It was

I06 AMONG THE MAORIS.

clear that a strong hand outside must take the
government of the country, and bring order out of
this confusion and bloodshed. The farce of recognis-
ing the Maoris as an independent nation, and paying
honours to a flag under which their independence
was to be proclaimed, was speedily ended. The
British resident, Mr. Busby, in 1835 did indeed gather
together a number of the principal chiefs, and arranged
that they should constitute an annual congress to
rule the " United Tribes of New Zealand," and petition
the king of England to be their patron and protector.

The whole affair soon became unmanageable, and
some action became necessary on the part of the
British Government. This was rendered more urgent
in consequence of the formation of the New Zealand
Company, a speculative trading concern for buying
land from the natives at merely nominal sums, and
selling it again to settlers. To give an idea of their
plan of doing business it may be mentioned that
upwards of a million acres were purchased for less
than fifty pounds, and that being not paid in English
gold but old muskets, barrels of gunpowder and shot,
and amongst other items " seventy-two hoes and a
gross of Jews' harps."

A Frenchman, Baron de Thierry, had in 1822
bought forty thousand acres of land for ten axes, and
under the Company the natives were being plundered
wholesale. Although the plan was promoted by men
of principle at home, it proved a stone of stumbling,
and led to oppression and injustice in dealing with
the ignorant Maoris. This state of things did not,
however, very much move the energies of the English
Government, but a stimulus from quite another
quarter soon led to the formal annexation of the
country to English rule.

SELWYN, THE FIRST BISHOP.

107

Louis Philippe was occupying the throne of France,
and he secretly sought some opportunity of gaining
an outlying country like New Zealand, as his country
had lost her colonial provinces in the late war. A
ship was prepared with sealed orders to take the
country in the name of France, when the English

BISHOP SELWYN.

Government, hearing of the expedition, sent Captain
Hobson in 1839 to ask the allegiance of the chiefs to
the British flag, and in 1842 the islands were formally
annexed to the English crown.

The Romish teachers bitterly resented this arrange-
ment, and did their best to stir up the natives against
it. Years of struggle followed, and thrice the British

I08 AMONG THE MAORIS.

flag was cut down, the hostility of tlic chiefs being
consummated in the terrible war about which some-
thing must be said further on.

On Christmas Day 1842 the good ship Toniatiii
sailed from Plymouth, her destination being New
Zealand ; on her deck, waving farewells to his many
friends, stood George Augustus Selwyn, a clergyman
of good promise and piety, who had been ordained to
the first bishopric of that country. In every respect
he was a remarkable man. While at Cambridge he
had shown gifts of a distinguished order, and those
marks of strong personality which pointed to a
leadership of men at no distant day. He was full of
apostolic zeal. From the very beginning his eyes
had looked across the sea to the needs of the heathen,
and when it was known that he had been appointed
to the new bishopric, everybody agreed that of
all men in the Church he was the best for the post.
Had he chosen to remain at home, a prospect of
speedy preferment was no doubt before him, but
his heart was set after service for God in that
far-off land, about which so much had already been
told in the missionary record of the past twenty
years.

The post was one requiring tact and firmness ; the
old difficulties which had distressed the work of
Marsden were coming up in various shapes, and with
the unsettled condition of New Zealand, the political
question was so inextricably mixed up with the
religious, that the man chosen to take the reins of
government in spiritual things would need special
qualifications and great grace. Selwyn possessed in
addition a fortune in the advantage of a fine and
well-trained physique, and in the University boat had
shown that he could endure hardness, and as an

SELWYN, THE FIRST BISHOP. IO9

athlete hold his own. All this stood him in good
stead during the hardships which he was to undergo
in his new sphere.

In the ship in which Selwyn sailed, a young New
Zealander formed one of the party, and it is charac-
teristic of the Bishop that during the voyage he so
mastered the language of the Maori that he could
freely catechise the young native in his own tongue,
so that when he landed he was able, on his first visit
to his diocese, to preach to the people. In addition
to this, he studied the art of navigation under the
captain, to fit him for managing his own ship when
cruising among the islands.

After making some necessary arrangements as
regards the work, he began his missionary tours by
walking for five months through his new diocese,
fording rivers, sleeping in the woods, and returning so
ragged and with his feet bound up with native flax,
that he entered Waimate, his new quarters, by a quiet
path unrecognised. "As for the people," he wrote,
" I love them from my heart, and my desire to serve
them grows day by day."

His next journey was in the little mission vessel,
TJie Flying Fish, and he was present at the outbreak
of war hostilities between the natives and English at
Kororareka, where the chief, Keke, had cut down the
English flagstaff. After a hot fight with the natives,
the small force of soldiers had to take refuge in the
ship. Afterwards, the Bishop and Mr. Williams went
ashore, and found the natives busy plundering the
place, but they passed unharmed amongst them.
After burying the dead and rescuing, as far as
possible, the papers and valuables of the English
settlers they crossed to the mission station, Paihia,
■where, after a service, they started out on horseback

no AMONG THE MAORIS.

to Waimat^. Looking behind them they saw the sky-
lurid with the burning of Kororarcka, and it was
difficult to foresee how much further this bloodshed
and ruin would extend. But the shouts of welcome
which greeted the Bishop's return to his station
cheered his heart. These Christian natives gathered
together and assured him that they would defend the
Mission to the very last. He felt that they were all
in the hands of God, and especially was delighted to
see the native children who were in their care. They
would be safe in the Good Shepherd's hands. " No
sooner was it heard," he writes, " that I was in the
house than a stream of little children flowed down
from the bedrooms in the upper storey, their black
eyes and white teeth sparkling in the candlelight, as
they crowded about me with smiling faces to shake
me by the hand. As some of the Christian natives
remarked, ' Though the heavens were black around
us there was the bright spot of blue sky which gave
hopes that the storm would soon pass away.' "

For a time he stayed at home busily at work in
perfecting his college and schools, and transplanting
the whole establishment to a more convenient site
within five miles of Auckland, and erecting a fresh
hospital for the sick. An unlooked-for trial awaited
them, however, for an epidemic broke out among the
natives, and a sick woman being inadvertently ad-
mitted within their walls, the whole college was
speedily attacked with the sickness, and his own
children were laid low. Weary nights and days of
watchful anxiety followed, but God was very merciful
to His faithful servant, and the sufferers survived.

In every part of the work the Bishop was ready to
help and advise. Often when coming home, weary
with his journeys, he would immediately plunge into

SELWYN, THE FIRST BISHOr. Ill

the audit of his college accounts or the regulation of
its domestic economy. Nothing seemed to escape his
notice, and his great aim was to infuse in the Christian
natives the idea that, however menial their work, it
was worth doing, as under the great Taskmaster's
eye. His college servants, the butcher, cook, etc., all
left him to take more lucrative positions in the colony,
and he conceived the idea of supplementing them
altogether by Maori youths. One who knew him
speaks of this as follows : —

" I well remember listening to a talk of his to a
student one morning on the consequences of unfaith-
fulness in the discharge of his duties as house-steward.
How it seemed probably a small thing to him to
intrust some Maori boy with the key to give out flour
or rice, and yet a little waste each day might in a few
months amount to a sum of money which would have
enabled the Bishop to bring some native child to be
taught and trained.

" Perhaps the young man at the time only received
the talk as a ' lecture,' but judging by his faithfulness
in an office of trust in after years, the seed bore fruit.
The Bishop was delighted to get hold of a little book
of directions, printed by Colonel Gold, of the 65th
Regiment, for the use of his men. After an appeal to
the elder men, the drummer boys were exhorted to
step smartly forward for the honour of the 65th.
With one of his happy, playful turns, he used to call
this book the Golden Rules.

" How his eyes used to kindle, and his whole face
light up with a smile as he read this, for this was the
spirit he desired to infuse into all his workers. And
they did respond in a way ; but most of them were
young and inexperienced, and the college system was
little understood, even by older men, whose sons were

112 AMONG THE MAORIS.

reaping the benefit of the Bishop's self-denying exer-
tions in the cause of education. The notion of
Englisli and natives working side by side on equal
terms, and with common privileges, was unpopular, and
so was the industrial system, though it alone enabled
the youths of both races to get a sound education."

His cruise in the Undine to the islands of Melanesia
and Polynesia, which were then in his diocese, had
filled him with love for the dark-skinned and equally
dark-minded natives for whose sake Bishop Patteson
afterwards gave his life. The youths from these
islands gathered with his Maori scholars, and nothing
delighted Selwyn's heart more than to receive
these waifs of the ocean into the shelter and safety of
his roof. Each Sunday the little wooden chapel he
had built used to be crowded with his flock, and it
was his custom to read the service half in Maori and
half in English, and in the afternoon to take the
Scripture classes. He had a lively and personal way
of dealing with his lads.

" What sort of men were the sons of Eli ? " was the
question put to a boy, who hung his head in silence,
for he was the unrighteous son of a godly parent.

Some of these boys had become acquainted with
English words on board ship, as was evidenced one
day when the Bishop was pointing out the import-
ance of not lying or deceiving others.

" Does God love boys who do something, and say
they have not done it ? " he asked of one of the
boys.

" No ; gainnion no good," was the reply.

Selwyn had an apt way of conveying his meaning

by signs when words failed. One day a chief inquired

if he might be baptised. " Do you wish to be one of

us ? " asked the Bishop. The man nodded his head.

SELWYN, THE FIRST BISHOP. II 3

Then Sehvyn held up two fingers, and bent down
one, which the chief clearly understood : it was to
show that he had two wives, and must put down one.

" I have never seen the Bishop's mode of dealing
with the Melanesians in their own islands, but I fancy
the way he wins their hearts at first is by his innate
humour, combined with thorough fearlessness, and,
above all, of course, a constraining love of souls, for
whom Christ died. They seem to know instinctively,
like dogs and children, that he loves them, and means
their good. At one savage place he was eyed sus-
piciously at first, but he brought forward one of his
own little boys he was bringing back to one of the
islands, and, pointing to the lantern-jaws of a little
native of the island, and then pulling out the fat
cheeks of his own little son, he made them under-
stand that he would do the same for any of their
children, if they would let him take them. When they
saw him poking his fingers into the hollow^s of one's
cheeks, and pulling out the fat of the other, they
danced and shouted with joy at the fun, and would
have let him carry off dozens."

The 22nd of May, 1853, the Bishop always spoke
of as " a day to be much remembered with thankful-
ness." He then ordained one of his native young
Maoris, Rota Waitoa, to the office of deacon. This
young man had been one of his companions in his
missionary journeys, and was the most promising of
his converts. This incident was all the more cheering
to Selwyn, as he had recently found his work hindered
and much discouraged by the insincerity and dis-
honourable conduct of two of his people at the college.
The subsequent history of Rota fully vindicated the
Bishop's confidence, and for twelve years he proved a
faithful helper in the work, and then died in the faith.

H

114 AMONG THE MAORIS.

The Bishop had now spent ten laborious and
happy years in New Zealand, and he decided to
return for a short space of time to England, in order
to still further plead for the work in which he was
engaged. He found his countrymen just in the
excitement of the Crimean war, and seeing the
enthusiasm for service which prevailed in the ranks of
the army, he implored the members of his Church to
send out with equal zeal soldiers of the Cross to
preach to the Maoris and Melanesians.

" There is no comfort," said he, " in the thought of
the heathen world but in the hope of the restoration
to the Church of the spirit of obedience. What com-
fort, I would ask, would there have been to any one
who had a son or brother in New Zealand in the time
of the war if he had been told that it had been left to
the free choice of every British soldier and sailor
whether he would go out to his rescue ? And in what
one respect, I would ask, are the men of our army
and navy more bound to foreign service than the
soldiers of the Cross ? "

Doubtless his stirring words were not without
result, as he went preaching a spiritual crusade
through the Churches ; but one notable effect was
that Patteson offered himself for the work; and said,
in strong faith and zeal : " Here am I, send me."
The history of that noble consecration is already in
the records of honourable service for the King, and
the two names of Selwyn and Patteson are equally
illustrious in the bead-roll of missionary worthies.*

It is not to be wondered at that Selwyn attracted
men of such a stamp to his Mission, for he held up
before them the true idea of service — that of regard-

* "Bishop Patteson, the Martyr of Melanesia.'" By Jesse Page.
Published by S. W. Partridge & Co., S 6c 9 Paternoster Row.

SELWYN, THE FIRST BISHOP. II5

lessness of self, and absolute loyalty to the Cross
To those who sought preferment or soft and comfort-
able seats in the Church of God he gave no sign of
welcome, for he could not only enforce a spirit of self-
sacrifice by words, but, unashamed, point to his own
example in this respect. His recommendation of an
increase of bishops, whose income should not exceed
i^500 a-year, was an invitation to share the simple
life and fare of his own episcopate.

People who visited Auckland sometimes asked
to see the Bishop's palace, and when they were
pointed to a dingy house of eight rooms, crammed
with native men, women, and children, they felt con-
strained to admit that such surroundings were in their
simplicity truly apostolic. The whole gross income
of his bishopric did not exceeed £1200 per annum,
^500 of which sum he reserved for himself, returning
the remainder to the common fund. When he was
informed that on the establishment of local govern-
ment in New Zealand his stipend had been omitted
from the estimates at home, and had not been pro-
vided for by the Colonial Budget, he was not by any
means distressed. " I have no objection," he said
" to occupying a see without an income, if called
upon to do so ; for," he added, " twelve years' resi-
dence in New Zealand has made me acquainted with
the best places for finding fern-roots and the haunts of
birds and fishes." Resolute and undismayed he faced
his path of duty, uttering these noble words : " I wish
to state, most clearly and distinctly, and in all
seriousness, that it is my intention to go back to my
diocese, and to dig or beg if need be for my main-
tenance, for I am ashamed of neither."

CHAPTER IX.

THE PEACEMAKER.

"Jesus, Thy wandering sheep behold ;
See, Lord, with tenderest pity see
The sheep that cannot find the fold,
Till sought and gathered in by Thee."

LIKE his brave predecessor, Marsden, the Bishop
suffered much misrepresentation and miscon-
' struction for his championship of the natives.
This contumely was shared with others, notably
Henry Williams, who had, as already has been shown,
won the confidence of the Maoris and made them in
his person respect the English people. But both he
and the Bishop shared the usual fate of those who
venture upon Christian mediation between contending
parties. The great point of justice which these two
brave Christian men insisted upon, was the right of
these Maoris to their ancestral lands, and the injustice
of the Company professing to sell to settlers what
they themselves had no title to possess. So strongly
did he feel on this point, that he was constrained to
draw up a statement in the form of a pastoral letter
ii6

THE PEACEMAKER. II7

to his people at New Plymouth, vindicating the posi-
tion he had taken. He referred to the odious charges
made against himself — even that of complicity with
a murderer — and affirmed that, in spite of all, he
would continue to support what he believed to be a
policy of righteousness in dealing with these natives.

" I hold it," said he, " to be an act unworthy of
Englishmen to avail ourselves of any native custom,
either of conquest or of slavery, to disenfranchise any
class of native proprietors ; especially when experience
has proved that when no party questions are raised,
the native title cannot be extinguished, and all classes
of claimants satisfied for a few halfpence per acre."

The question of the acquisition of their land had
become a burning one in the minds of the Maoris,
and they began to cherish a deep sense of distrust
towards the European colonists. For years, such
considerations of the right of territory had been a
source of trouble between themselves, and blood had
flowed freely in the tribal wars in defence or aggres-
sion of what they felt were their rightful boundaries.
The case of Taranaki, to which the Bishop referred in
his charge above quoted, had aroused the feeling of
the natives to a high pitch. The difficulty had arisen
because no one appeared to have a valid title to the
land. When one chief, Teira, offered to sell a piece
of property suitable for a harbour at the mouth of the
Waitara River, another, Wiremu Kingi, interfered and
claimed it as his own, and when, to end the dispute,
the governor took possession of it, having paid the
purchase money, the native women rushed forwards
and pulled up the stones and boundary marks as fast
as they were affixed.

Then came the inevitable soldiers, and when the
question arose before the New Zealand Assembly,

Il8 AMONG THE MAORIS.

Bishop Schvyn took the part of the Maori King
Wiremu, and protested.

As frequently happens in such cases, the irritation
was intensified by the discovery that a Maori had
been found dead in the woods, and the white men
were suspected of treachery. Soon after, tidings
reached the Bishop that an army of four hundred
natives were on their way to the EngHsh settlement
to have their revenge. He at once mounted his horse
and rode hard towards the threatened village, warned
the colonists at sunrise of their danger, and then left
his horse and waded through a mud swamp up to his
knees to meet the enemy. As soon as he was in their
midst, and after much talk over the matter, he got them
to put away their muskets and join him in a service
of prayer to God. He found out the brother of the
dead Maori in full fighting style with his gun ready
for vengeance, but a few words soon cooled the hot
spirit of the man.

It is very important to record how much in these
perilous times the white people owed to the interven-
tion of the Bishop. After his death, many testimonies
were given of his brave protection, and one which
appeared in an Auckland newspaper from the pen of
an old settler, sets forth the following interesting
particulars : —

" No isolated household requiring a warning of the
near approach and evil intentions of the stealthy foe,
but the Bishop was the first to sound the tocsin, and
personally assist the family to a secure place of
refuge. Sure I am, that the first European settlers
of Manku, humanly speaking, owed their lives to
Bishop Selwyn's untiring watchfulness and fore-
thought. Well I remember the early spring of i860,
upon the occasion of a native being killed in the

THE PEACEMAKER. II9

bush, when our lives were considered in such jeopardy
that the governor ordered a vessel to be sent to the
Manku river to rescue us from imminent peril. His
Excellency's message for us to go on board reached
us during breakfast one morning, and was quickly
followed by the stealthy step of a friendly Maori, who
came to urge us to go away at once, as they had
planned to kill us that night. We quickly turned
the calves to the cows, opened the doors of the pig-
styes, but silver was as dross to dear life, and we left
the spoons on the breakfast table, and hastened to
the refuge so kindly sent for our relief On the
Raven in the Manku Creek were collected the whole
of the white population — amounting to some sixty
souls — and there we spent two days awaiting orders
from headquarters, when Mr. Purchas came to inform
us that the Bishop and Mr. Maunsell had gone and
met Wiremu Kingi (William King) and the war-
party at Tuakau, and influenced them to abandon
their hostile intentions towards us, and return to
Waikato ; consequently we might disembark and
safely return to our homes. You may be sure we
speedily took advantage of this joyful intelligence,
and I happened to be the first to reach Upper
Manku. The desolation those two days of abrupt
absence had caused beggars description. Calves bleat-
ing for food, cows standing by their unknown progeny
nearly bursting with milk, pigs rooting up carrots,
turnips, onions, strawberry beds, etc. But all this
was as nothing when I descried a well-known figure
descending a hill near, and approaching the house.
I ran to the gate, which I had scarcely reached when
I saw the Bishop, who had dismounted from his horse,
and was taking from the saddle a small haversack.
I accosted him : ' My lord, I suppose you know we

I20 AMONG THE MAORIS.

have all just left the vessel and returned to our
homes. Have we done ris^ht?' He replied 'Yes,
I know all about it. Will you let me leave my
horse here until to-morrow, as I am going to Pura-
pura?' I said, 'Certainly; but you cannot proceed
to-night ; it is eight or nine miles, an obscure bush
track, and now past 4 o'clock. Come in, take some
refreshment, and go in the morning.' His reply was,
' No, thank you, I have bread in my kit, and must
push on at once, but shall probably be back early
in the morning.' And return he did at 6 a.m.,
drenched to the skin, having had to ford a creek.
He took my hand, and said in his own kind and
musical voice, ' I know you will forgive my not
answering your question yesterday, but now I will
make a clean breast and tell you all. You know
Mr. Maunsell and I intercepted the Maoris at Tua-
kau, and after we had arranged with William King
for their return, we found a party of the most reck-
less of them had, while we were talking, taken a
canoe and started off, intent on mischief So I
volunteered to go to Purapura and get the chiefs
there to prevent a war-party passing over their land,
without which permission they could not proceed to
Manku. This the chiefs William Wesley and Adam
Clarke have promised to do, but I will remain here
until all danger from these wild spirits has passed.'
And so he did, guarding us with jealous care, never
seeming to sleep soundly, for upon any unusual
noise in the night he was up and out in a moment."

But his championship of the Maori cost him dearly,
and, incredible as it may seem, this brave good man
was hooted and insulted by the colonists when he
next went to Taranaki. His one crime was that of
taking up the cause of the natives in the lamentable

THE PEACEMAKER. 1 23

war which was beginning, and yet in his efforts to
promote reconcihation and peace, he was frank and
faithful in his deaHngs with English and Maori alike.
An instance of his tact must be related here. One
of the chiefs had remonstrated with the governor
upon his refusal to let the natives have guns and
powder. " My custom," said the chief, " with regards
to my enemy is, if he have not a weapon, I give him
one, that we may fight on equal terms. Now, O
Governor, are you not ashamed of my defenceless
hands ? " Soon afterwards the Bishop went away
into the bush and heard of the murder of a white
boy by some Maoris. One night the Bishop was
sitting with a number of natives round a fire, as was
his custom, and they were entertaining him with
wild stories of weird appearances and superstitious
scenes. " Now," said the Bishop, " shall I tell you a
ghost story ? " They were delighted, and sat in a
ring listening with intense attention.

" There was once a man who dreamed a dream
that he was sitting with a large party round a fire,
when out of the fire there rose up a figure of a man,
who said, ' O Governor, if I had an enemy and he
had no weapon I would give him one before we
fought. O Governor, were you not ashamed of
my defenceless hands ? ' and he stretched them out."
The people all applauded the sentiment which was
so just and true ; but the dream went further.
" After a time there arose up another figure out
of the fire, and looked on them : it was a white
face, very pale, and blood was streaming down it :
the figure was dressed like an English boy, and
held a bullock whip. Slowly he too stretched out
his arm, and said to the Maoris, ' Were you not
ashamed of my defenceless hands ? ' "

124 AMONG THE MAORIS.

The point of the story could not fail to be appreci-
ated, and the Bishop's words were carried far and
wide amoni;" the tribes. In all this work of media-
tion he certainly had to "rough it." One night,
through the churlishness of an unfriendly chief,
he had to lodge in a pigstye, which undistin-
guished shelter he made a little cleaner and more
comfortable with his own hands ; laying down
some ferns as a couch, and sleeping soundly with
what may justly be called strange bedfellows for a
Bishop.

The patriotic party among the Maoris, led by their
king-maker, Wiremu Tamahana, was gaining ground ;
and right into the midst of the assemblies the Bishop
came, appealing to them to be friends, calling himself
a half-caste, half-Maori, half-English, and entreating
them to submit to law and moderation. Stretching
forth his hands to the thousands about him, and
speaking eloquently and earnestly in their own
wonderful language, he concluded his address with
the words, " O, all ye tribes of New Zealand sitting
in council here, I beseech you, in the name of our
Lord Jesus Christ, in whom we all believe, I hope, to
agree to the proposal by which we shall all live in
peace and happiness."

In spite of his exertions, however, war speedily
broke out, and as he could no longer act as mediator
between the combatants, he joined the English troops
as chaplain, to attend to the sick and give Christian
burial to the dead. " If there must be war," said he,
" our great effort ought to be at least to debrutalise it."

He never spared himself, and his conduct during
these conflicts was most heroic. On one occasion
an officer, looking through the telescope, saw the
figure of a lonely man by the side of a stream trying

THE PEACEMAKER. 1 25

its depths with a stick. Presently he took off his
clothes and swam across with them above his head,
and afterwards gaining the opposite shore, he resumed
his journey. This was the Bishop on his way to
counsel certain catechists who needed his encourage-
ment and help. In the fights he was moving to and
fro as with a charmed life, carrying the wounded
under the hottest fire, and speaking cheery and
comforting words, in the Maori tongue, to the help-
less men stretched everywhere upon the ground.
His association with the troops, however, was largely
misunderstood by the natives, and they were dis-
appointed and alarmed to think that their Bishop,
in whom they had such confidence, had apparently
taken sides against them.

After one of the battles which occurred in the
summer of 1863, when he had been carrying a
wounded Maori soldier into camp, he had to get
two Englishmen to help him, and for a short time
walked himself behind carrying the soldier's gun.
This was not fully noticed by the distant natives ;
all they saw was the Bishop carrying arms, and, as
a consequence, it became a belief throughout the
country that he was a fighting enemy against them
like the other v/hite men. It took two years to
get rid of the baseless suspicion ; and then the
wounded Maori who had been succoured came to
the front, and, in a large native meeting, told his
story, and how the Bishop happened to be carrying
his gun.

After the war the Bishop was awarded a medal
for brave service, and many who had watched with
admiration his brave and Christian conduct, gave
him a sum of money wherewith to put stained
windows in his little chapel. The design for one

126 AMONG THE MAORIS.

of these was, at his suggestion, commemorative of an
act of heroism on the part of a native chief This
chiefs name was Henare Taratoa, and he was one
of the Bishop's young men at the native college. He
was a man of ability and force of character, and when
the war broke out he went to his countrymen to fight
with them in what he felt to be a patriotic struggle.
At the battle of Gate Pah, where the English troops
suffered some considerable loss, he was in charge of
the Maoris, and laid down his life with great bravery
at the close when the English charged the natives.
Upon the body of the prostrate Maori was found the
" Orders for the Day," and they began with a prayer to
God in Maori, and then the words of Romans xii. verse
20, " If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give
him drink." How faithfully these Christian principles
had been carried out was seen by an incident which
transpired at the beginning of the battle. Some
English officers and soldiers were wounded and
left in the Pah, and one of these was carefully tended
by Henare Taratoa all through the night. In his
last hours the dying man besought this good Samar-
itan to get him a drink of water, but no supply
could be obtained except at a distance of three miles,
and that immediately within the English lines.
Trusting in God and fearing no evil, this noble
chief made his way down to the pool and, almost
under the eyes of the sentries, filled his calabash
with water, and brought it back to moisten the lips
of his enemy.

This story may well illustrate the way in which
the leaven of Christ's spirit and example is seen
in the conduct of a man only recently saved from
the darkness of heathenism.

CHAPTER X.

THE HAU-HAU APOSTASY.

" Though in affliction's furnace tried,

Unhurt, on snares and death I '11 tread ;

Though sin assail, and hell, thrown wide,
Pour all its flames upon my head.

Like Moses' bush, I '11 mount the higher.

And flourish, unconsumed in fire."

THE terrible war, which had already been so
disastrous to the work of the mission stations,
and brought back the old spirit of revenge and
blood-thirstiness to the Maoris, found a new
development which was destined to be one of the
most remarkable instances of superstition in the
record of mission labour. As in the Soudan the
Madhi led his fanatical Arabs against the English
army, so in New Zealand, at this time, arose a man of
like character, who proclaimed throughout the country
a relentless war against the English and their religion.
He was a Taranaki chief, named Horopapera Te Ua,
and as he had already attracted the attention of his
tribe by his insane conduct, he was bound by chain

127

128 AMONG THE MAORIS.

and padlock as a dangerous lunatic, but like one
possessed he broke his bands, and no man could
control him. This dangerous man appeared just as
the native mind was at high tension with the excite-
ment of the war, and proclaimed himself a prophet
sent from heaven. He attributed his escape from his
fetters to the direct interposition of the angel Gabriel
and the Virgin Mary, and said that these celestial
visitants had declared to him great victories over the
foreigners if they could utter a bark like a dog, " Hau-
Hau," and follow the directions of the new prophet.
The new creed which he proclaimed was not unlike
Mohammedanism, and was termed " Pai Marire,"
which meant " Bide your time " or, as it has been
otherwise translated, " The all-holy." It renounced
the Christian religion root and branch, but took up
with ready loyalty the Old Testament in its literal
teaching as its guide. Upon this was engrafted the
strongest mixture of fanatical rites and incantations,
all the old superstitions of the Maoris having appar-
ently risen again in the new religion. The people
were taught that the natives of New Zealand had
been exalted to take the place of the ancient Jewish
people, and that it was the duty of the Maoris to show
great respect for the Jews wherever they met with
them. Thus it happened, that during the terrible
onslaught which these fanatics made upon the Christ-
ians, in no case was any injury done to the Hebrew
race. Old Testament names were freely distributed
amongst the Maoris, the English Christians were sup-
posed to represent Pharaoh, the oppressor of Egypt,
and the prophet called himself the Moses who would
soon thrust the enemy into the deeps of the sea. The
worst passions of the people were resorted to, and the
practices of the new superstition were revolting. It

THE HAU-HAU APOSTASY. 131

is not surprising that under such circumstances the
natives relapsed into barbarism, and their cannibal
practices, which Christianity had to a large extent
exterminated, once more appeared with dreadful
frequency.

The king movement which had so possessed the
mind of the people soon became a thing of the past,
and the patriotic party seeing how widely the fanatical
fervour was spreading were only too glad to take
advantage of it, and adopt its force as their own.
Unchecked, the wave of superstition swept on ; mis-
sion stations, once the home of peaceful teaching and
resounding with praise to God, were destroyed ruth-
lessly, and the converts scattered. In some cases the
Christian natives armed themselves and fought for
their lives, one of them, at Wanganui, succeeding in
defeating a company of Hau-Hau fanatics. The pahs
were now the scene of warlike activity, natives running
hither and thither with their guns, or sitting with their
chiefs in earnest conclave, preparing for some fresh
and concerted onslaught upon their foes.

A missionary, Mr. Booth, who had come in spite of
warnings into the midst of the fanatics, was ill-used,
and would have met with instant death had it not
been for the intervention of a friendly chief, who had
in past times received some kindness from him, and
now returned it by arranging the safe escape of the
missionary and his family. At a place called Ranana
a message was sent into the town stating that the
Hau-Haus would shortly be there to sweep the English
into the sea, and while they were meditating upon
the best way of defending the place, the wild horde
of half-mad warriors came on. The loyal natives
assembled to give battle at an island called Montua,
and under a brave chief, Hemi Nape, they were able

132 AMONG THE MAORIS.

to beat back their assailants. Soon, however, he fell
in the struggle, and his followers for a moment lost
heart, which gave the enemy the advantage, and they
were driven from the island into the river. Another
rally was made, and this time Haimona Hiroti, who
had assumed the leadership, overcame the Ilau-Haus,
killed their leader, Mateme, and pursued his flying
forces for some distance. This was the most whole-
sale check the movement had yet received, and saved
the colony of Wanganui from destruction. When
the brave Christian natives came into the town with
the good news of their victory, they were gratefully
welcomed, and the British flag was hoisted half-mast
high as a mark of respect for those of their number
who had fallen in the fray.

One brave missionary, however, was destined to
seal the faith with his blood. This was the Rev. Carl
Volkner, a devout and consecrated man, who had
been ordained and appointed to the work by Bishop
Selwyn. The story of his death has been so admir-
ably told in the " Conquests of the Cross " that it shall
be quoted here.

" He was stationed at Opotiki, in Bay of Plenty, on
the breaking out of the war, and being persuaded to
fly had removed his wife to Auckland ; but his heart
was with his flock, and he spent most of his time with
them, nursing several cases of virulent fever when the
sufferers' own relatives had abandoned them, and
thus incurring a double danger to his own life. In
the close, stifling atmosphere of his hospital hut he
laid down his life for the spiritual good of the sick,
just as he was imperilling it in visiting Opotiki at all.
He was accompanied on one of his approaches in a
coasting schooner by a brother missionary, when large
numbers of natives were seen lining the river banks

THE HAU-HAU APOSTASY. , 1 33

as they sailed up unapprehensive of danger, and on
casting anchor they were warned to escape, as the
Maoris had vowed to kill them. Two days before a
rebel chief had been there recruiting for his army by
preaching the new fanatical faith; the Hau-Hau
standard had been reared near the church, with the
device of a letter of the Hebrew alphabet emblazoned
upon it ; the missionaries had been spoken of bitterly,
and the fanatics in their mad joy had promised them-
selves to cut off Mr. Volkner's head and send it as a
trophy to Zerubbabel, the great prophet of the new

REV. CARL VOLKNER.

faith. A Maori ex-policeman greatly excited the
people by an address and exhibition of a soldier's
head, which was said to speak at sunset. He de-
nounced Christianity, and spoke with asperity of the
missionaries as having robbed them of their lands by
a system of lying.

" On the Sunday, a dance round the worship post
was kept up, and a gibberish was muttered, said to be
the speech of the Hau-Hau god. Mr. Volkner's
house was entered, and his goods spoiled, while the

134 AMONG THE MAORIS.

people were in a delirium of excitement, and the
impostor swept clean the fruits of many years of
missionary toil, in his visit of a few days. Bibles and
prayer-books were torn up, and the Christian catechist,
left in charge, was the first to adhere to the new
doctrine of devils. The missionaries were warned
too late ; natives crowded the beach, as they landed,
in a whirl of savage joy, and women danced with
hideous gestures. The crew of the schooner, together
with the missionaries, were imprisoned in a wJiare
with a guard of twenty armed men over them,
although two Jews were set at liberty, and were re-
assured by the Hau-Haus that, being of the same
religion, they had nothing to fear.

" Mr. Volkner prepared to meet his fate with Christ-
ian fortitude. 'We must put our trust in God,' he
said, in the great extremity. In the morning he was
summoned to a meeting. On his way he was informed
that he was about to die, and without a murmur he
went to his fate, only asking permission to kneel down
and pray. They stripped him and bandaged his eyes,
and hoisted him up to a high branch of a tall willow
tree, by a block and tackle brought from the schooner
for the purpose ; while he warned his murderers of
the great crime they were committing, he expressed
his own forgiveness, shook hands frankly with them,
then bravely and calmly resigned himself into their
hands. Noble, simple, guileless, and inoffensive, this
true servant of the Lord died with the Lord's prayer
on his lips : ' Father forgive them, for they know not
what they do.' The savages were surprised to see
tears in his eyes. For an hour and a half his body
was left dangling in mid-air, amidst the derisive shouts
of the fanatics, and life was not extinct when it was
carried into the church. The other prisoners were set

THE HAU-HAU APOSTASY. I35

at liberty, with the exception of Mr. Grace, the
missionary. The great Hau-Hau chief returned the
next day, and summoned all Europeans to meet him
in the church. He censured his followers for their
deed, and agreed to release Mr. Grace, on condition
that a brother rebel chief, taken captive by the
English, should be restored. The remains of Mr.
Volkner's body were decently interred."

Bishop Selwyn was deeply moved and grieved by
this disastrous turn which events had assumed, and
when he heard of the murder of Volkner, he hastened
in a ship to Bay of Plenty, the scene of the deed. For
a long time he could get no tidings of Mr. Grace, the
other missionary whose life had been spared. At
last he sent a Jew on shore to make enquiries, and
after a time of terrible anxiety, for the Maoris were
galloping on horseback along the shore to prevent the
escape of Mr. Grace, this missionary leapt into the
boat and was soon out of harm's way. The Bishop
received him on board the ship with gratitude, and
hastened to send tidings of his safety to Mrs. Grace
by a letter to Mrs. Selwyn.

But in a few months this strange movement began
to burn itself out. Its rise may be attributed to
several causes, Bishop Selwyn himself believing that
the land question was at the bottom of it, and that
the Hau-Hau superstition, with its awful persecution,
was " simpl}- an expression of a loss of faith in every-
thing English, clergy and all alike." When the war
and the Hau-Hau movement had come to a close, he
gave it as his opinion that, as a nation, we had made
the fatal mistake in New Zealand of seeking first " the
other things " instead of " the one thing needful." We
had our chance with this people and missed it. " It is
not many years since the Queen's name was honoured

136 AMONG THE MAORIS.

throughout New Zealand ; and no more acceptable
hope could be held out to the Maoris than that the
two races might grow up to be one people, with one
faith and under one sovereign. All this time they
sold their land faster than we could pay for it, from
^d. to lod. per acre, wishing nothing more than to
have houses built, grounds laid out, and Englishmen
settled amongst them. ' O Earth, Earth, Earth ! '
such has been our cry. The Queen, law, religion
have been thrust aside in the one thought of the
acquisition of land."

Other conditions, however, may have contributed
to this unparalleled and swift apostacy. The spiritual
work may have been more superficial than was sus-
pected, and natives had presented themselves whole-
sale for baptism in whose hearts no definite work of
grace had possibly been accomplished. In any case
it was over-ruled for good, and when again the
missionaries entered afresh upon this sphere of labour
they felt that the spiritual change to be insisted upon
in their teaching must be nothing short of the radical
one of conversion, and that the work of winning the
Maori race to Christ must involve a real consecration
of character and much earnest prayer. What results
have since accrued by this fresh work of evangelising
in New Zealand, the closing chapter will show.

The remainder of the career of Bishop Selwyn may
be summed up in a few words. In 1867 he visited
England once more and placed before the attention
of his countrj-men the claims of his diocese across the
seas. While thus engaged, the see of Lichfield
became vacant by the death of Bishop Lonsdale, and
the Earl of Derby in a courteous letter asked Selwyn
to accept the vacant see. The offer was at once
refused, for his heart was with his New Zealanders,

THE HAU-HAU APOSTASY. 1 37

but great pressure was brought to bear upon him,
and at the wish of the Queen he gave his consent and
became Bishop of Lichfield. With characteristic zeal
he set to work in his new sphere in the Potteries, and
every one felt that the appointment was a popular
and suitable one. The decision had, however, cost
him much ; his twenty-seven years of association with
New Zealand had made him feel the keenest sense of
loss at the thought of not returning to her shores.
But he found that there were heathen at home and a
work in those Staffordshire towns which would call
forth all his missionary energies. The public
appreciation of his new position was well expressed
in a poem which appeared in Punch at the time, three
verses of which shall be quoted here : —

" Long, long, the warm Alaori hearts that so loved him
May watch and may wait for his coming again,
He has sowed the good seed there, his Master has moved
him
To his work among savages this side the main.
In 'the Black Countiy,' darker than ever New Zealand,
'Mid worse ill than heathenism's worst can combine,
He must strive with the savages reared in our free land.
To toil, drink, and die, round the forge and the mine.

" Say, if We'nsbury roughs, Tipton cads, Bilston bullies,

Waikato can match, Taranaki excel ?
Find in New Zealand's clearings, or wild ferny gullies.

Tales those Dudley pit-heaps and nail-works could tell.
A labour more brutal, a leisure more bestial.

Minds raised by less knowledge of God or of man.
More in manners that's savage and less that's celestial.

Can New Zealand show than the Black Country can ?

"A fair field, my Lord Bishop — fair field and no favour —
For your battle with savagery, sufif'ring, and sin.
To Mammon, their God, see where rises the savour
Of the holocausts offered his blessing to win.

138 AMONG THE MAORIS.

Your well-practised courage, your hold o'er the brethren,
From, not to, New Zealand for work ought to roam ;

If// be dark, what must the Black Country be then.
What's the savage o'er sea to the savage at home ?"

He went on a visit to New Zealand the following
year, and was welcomed with salutations and with
prayers. A Maori clergyman was the spokesman of
the native Church, and speaking in his own tongue,
thus addressed the Bishop : — " Sire, the Bishop !
salutations to you and to mother (Mrs. Selwyn) !
We, the people of the places to which you first came,
still retain our affection for you both. Our not seeing
you occasions us grief, because there will be no seeing
you again. We rejoiced at hearing that you were
coming to see us ; great was the joy of the heart ;
and now, hearing that it cannot be, we are again in
grief.

" Sire, great is our affection for you both, who are
now being lost among us. But how can it be helped,
in consequence of the word of our great one, the
Queen ?

" Sire, our thought with regard to you is, that you
are like the poor man's lamb, taken away by the rich
man. This is our parting wish for you both : Go,
Sire, and may God preserve you both ! May He also
provide a man to take your place of equal powers
with yourself! Go, Sire, we shall no more see each
other in the body, but we shall see one another in our
thoughts. However, we are led and protected and
sanctified by the same Spirit. Such is the nature of
this short life to sunder our bodies ; but, in a little
while, when we shall meet in the assembly of the
saints, we shall see each other face to face, one fold
under one Shepherd. This is our lament for you in
few words : —

THE HAU-HAU APOSTASY. 139

"'Love to our friend, who has disappeared abruptly from the
ranks !
Is he a small man that he was so beloved ?
He has not his equal among the many.
The food he dispensed is longed for by me.' "

On his return to Lichfield he again threw himself
into work and continued doing good service for the
Master. But his work began to tell upon him, and
many noticed that the finely-balanced athletic frame
was giving way. His face was flushed after visiting
a sick friend, and signs of paralysis became sadly
evident. After one of his confirmation services,
conducted bravely amid much pain, he said in the
vestry : " I believe I have come to the end of my
tether" — and it proved a prophecy only too true.
Prostrate at last upon the bed, he waited with sub-
mission the moment when

" The figure clothed from head to foot
That keeps the keys of all the creeds,"

should enter his chamber. After lying very ill and
unconscious for hours, the good Bishop awaked as out
of a dream, and smiled to hear those about his bed
singing Bonar's well-known hymn —

" A few more years shall roll."

Then, with the morning sun streaming in a golden
flow through the windows, there came to him the
sweet promise of a brighter dawn, and in Maori he
whispered to himself —

" It will be light."

The good Bishop Selwyn, on the nth April, 1878,
reached his everlasting rest.

. , .s.^v:-)cr..'--.

CHAPTER XI.

THE MAORIS AT HOME.

" Speak, and the deaf shall hear Thy voice,
The blind his sight receive ;
The dumb in songs of praise rejoice,
The heart of stone believe."

BEFORE proceeding further, it will possibly be of
interest to glance at the Maoris at home. To
look at them, however, not as they now are,
a remnant of partly civilised aborigines, but
as they were when the missionaries first came to their
shores and during their early and eventful years.
For evidence upon this point we have only to refer
to the interesting journals and records of the time.

It has been generally agreed that the early Maori
race was of a Polynesian stock, the mixture of the
Malay and Papuan race. Like all savage nations,
they carefully treasure the tradition of their past
history, and, without written record, keep alive in
song and saga the deeds of their ancestors. The
Maoris speak of a time when from some distant land
they came to the shores of their present country,
140

THE MAORIS AT HOME.

141

the names of the canoes and their commanders are
kept, and this tradition is faithfully handed down
from father to son.

The infancy of the Maori is so full of trouble and
perils that it cannot be said that these people begin
life happily. When the child is but a few hours old

MAORI MOTHER AXD CHILD.

it is wrapped up in a mat or leaves, and laid upon
the ground under the shade of a tree, there to endure
no small discomfort until its mother proceeds to
flatten its little nose, and make the necessary hole
in the ear to carry future ornaments. One can
imagine the suffering caused by a rough stick being

142 AMONG THE MAORIS.

forced into this aperture, purposely keeping it un-
healed for months, so that it may serve its purpose
better later on. The baptism of the child is an
important event, and brings the priest upon the
scene with his incantations and charms. Mr. Yates,
one of the most valued missionaries, who was a
frequent witness of the rite, thus describes it : —

" The baptismal ceremony is generally performed
as follows ; though, in different tribes, there is a
difference in some particulars : When the infant
has reached the age of five or eight days, it is carried
in the arms of a woman to the side of a stream,
and is then by her delivered over to the priest, who
has placed a small stick in the ground, previously
notched in five places, before which he holds up
the infant, in an erect position, for a few minutes.
During this period, should anything inconvenient
occur, it is considered a bad omen, and that the
child will either die before it arrives at man's estate,
or turn out a paltry, worthless coward : if otherwise,
it is looked upon as most propitious, and the infant is
regarded with much complacency, as being likely to
become a brave and warlike man ; the utmost care
is then taken of him by his parents, and he is
nurtured in all the superstitions and evil practices
of his forefathers. The ceremony of holding up
before the stick being ended, the child is dipped
in the water, or sprinkled, at the option of the person
who performs the ceremony ; a name given to it ;
and the priest mumbles something over it, which
none of the bystanders comprehend. They never
tell what they have said ; and the prayer, if such
it may be called, is held too sacred to be made
known to any but the initiated : it is, however, an
address to some unknovvn spirit, who, they suppose,

THE MAORIS AT HOME. 1 43

holds in his hands the destinies of men and of birds.
I have, however, been informed that the general
contents of this prayer are, that the child may be
so influenced by this spirit, as to become cruel,
brave, warlike, troublesome, adulterous, murderous,
a liar, a thief, a disobedient person, and, in a word,
they may be guilty of every crime. Emblematically
of this, small pebbles, about the size of a very large
pin's head, are thrust down its throat, to make its
heart callous, hard, and incapable of pity. After
the prayer has been uttered, and the pebbles
swallowed, the child is carried home in the arms of
the person by whom he was baptised ; and if he
has received the name of any great man, he is
presented to the friends of that person who are
present, to be eaten by them, because the child has
assumed a name which ought to be considered sacred,
and is thereby deemed guilty of an almost unpardon-
able offence. As a ransom for the life of the infant,
and for the presumption of the priest, large presents
of food are made to all strangers. A feast is pre-
pared— the child is restored, with singing, into the
arms of its parents — and old and young sit down to
enjoy themselves in true New Zealand style."

The object of all these supernatural attentions,
however, frequently dies of pure starvation. If it
cannot have the mother's milk there is nothing else
provided, as the natives have no notion whatever
of artificial food for infant constitutions.

The houses of the natives are wind and water-tight,
although built only of bulrushes and carefully lined
with plaited leaves of the palm tree. They have
small windows, and these, like the doors, are closed
by means of a sliding shutter. The woodwork of the
posts is curiously carved, sometimes showing con-

144 AMONG THE MAORIS.

siderablc skill and grace. No furniture is seen within
— a lot of bulrushes thrown on the floor is their sleep-
ing couch ; a little carved box is kept ready to receive
their ornaments ; and in the corner arc the few stones
which constitute their cooking utensils. In every
village is the store, which is always built at the top
of the highest trees, made by platforms hung on
strong ropes and well shaded from the sun. Here
their stock of potatoes or corn is kept well out of the
way of damp or rats, and is less likely to be invaded
by a thief It is here also where they store their flax,
which, for use and for barter, is the staple commodity
of the country. From its thread they weave their
nets, their clothes, and twist their ropes, and, until
the introduction of European blankets, it occupied
the women the greater part of their time working at
the native mats, the only tool they used consisting
of two small sticks to hold the garment by and to
secure the line to which the warp was fastened. It is
all knotted, and the process is most tedious, requiring
from three to four months' close sitting to complete
one of the kaitakas — the finest sort of mat which they
make. This special native garment was, so we are
told, of very silky appearance, great care having been
taken in cleaning and bleaching the flax. Speaking
of these, Mr. Yates says : " They are sometimes made
nine feet by seven or eight, with a deep rich black
and white border, fancifully worked. The natives
of the south much excel the Bay of Islanders in pro-
ducing this article. They are seldom worn but by
persons of some consideration. ^\\& patai is a small
unornamented garment worn round the waist, and
reaching down to the knees : this is generally worn
by females. The koroavai and tatata are two gar-
ments nearly alike in texture : they both have a

THE MAORIS AT HOME.

145

number of loose strings hanging outside, which gives
them a neat and comfortable appearance. The ngeri
is the garment worn outside in rainy weather, and
used also, when the ground is damp, as a mattress, for
which it is no bad substitute. This garment is made
upon the principle of thatching, and is perfectly im-
pervious to rain, however heavy. A native dressed

A TATTOOED CHIEF.

in this, when he is seated, bears no bad resemblance
to a bee-hive, particularly when he perches himself
upon a heap of stones, and folds his knees up to his
chin. To notice, or even to name, all the varieties
of clothing would be tedious and useless ; and as they
differ so very little as to be scarcely perceptible, we

K

146 AMONG THE MAORIS.

will pass them over, only obscrvinj^ that male and
female, master and slave, when they can afford it, are
dressed much alike."

Perhaps the most distinctive characteristic of the
Maoris is their practice of tattooing the face. To
their taste this is the perfection of beauty, and cer-
tainly the acquirement of these curved lines upon
their features is gained by a terrible ordeal. With
all their apparent insensibility to suffering, and per-
fect patience and self-command, it is impossible for
the stoutest-hearted of these men to endure more than
a little of this tattooing at one time. With their
heads between the knees of the operating man, the
incisions are made with mallet and chisel as a sculptor
would work in his marble, and it is weeks, or even
months, before the adornment is complete. In addi-
tion to this artificial defacement, the Maori warrior is
an adept at making grimaces ; and part of their battle
tactics is their horrible gesticulations and hideous
grimaces.

The war dance of the Maoris once seen will never
be forgotten. They work themselves up to a fit of
desperation. Dr. Thomson, who for eleven years
resided in New Zealand, thus describes it : —

" When a conflict was inevitable the New Zealanders
did not flinch from it, although they actually fought
under the influence of what is called by Englishmen
' Dutch courage.' This species of bravery was not
drawn from imbibing spirits or swallowing or smok-
ing stimulants, but from the excitement of oratory
and the war dance. It was quick, fierce, and impetu-
ous, more suitable for attacking than defending posts,
and under its impulse campaigns were generally
settled by one battle. Influenced by passion more
than prudence, they advanced in fits of temporary

THE MAORIS AT HOME. I47

madness, and fled if victor}^ was not won before the
depression which invariably follows.

" When both armies were alike confident of success,
a pitched battle resulted. They approached close to
each other, and chiefs and warriors advanced in front
of their respective legions and delivered exciting
harangues. In the orations, every subject was men-
tioned capable of goading them to fury ; allusions were
made to the tribe's former greatness, the favour of the
gods, the bravery of their ancestors, and that the blood
of their fathers formerly shed was not yet avenged.

" As the orators proceeded with inflammatory
addresses, the war parties threw off their mats,
daubed their bodies with red ochre and charcoal,
twisted their long head-hair into lumps, adorned it
with feathers, and roused their blood to greater fervour
by the war dance.

" It is impossible to describe this extraordinary dance.
The whole army, after running about twenty yards,
arranged itself in lines, five, ten, twenty, or even forty
feet deep, and then all squatted down in a sitting
posture. Suddenly, at a given signal by the leader,
all started to their feet, having weapons in their right
hands. With the regularity of a regiment at drill,
each man elevated the right leg and right side of
the body, then the left leg and left side ; and
then, like a flash of lightning, jumped two feet from
the ground, brandishing and cleaving the air with his
weapon, and yelling a loud chorus, which terminated
with a long, deep, expressive sigh, and was accom-
panied with gaping mouths, inflated nostrils, distorted
faces, out-hanging tongues, and fixed, starting eyes,
in which nothing was seen but the dark pupil sur-
rounded with white. Every muscle quivered. Again
and again these movements were enacted, and was

148 AMONG THE MAORIS.

marked by striking their thighs with their open left
hands so as to produce one sound, and by old naked
women daubed over with red ochre, acting as fuglers
in front of the dancers. Songs were hkewise chanted
to preserve order in the host."

The fortification of a Maori chief is called a pah,
and serves for defence in time of war, into which the
women and children of the various tribes hide in safety.
Fixed generally on the top of a high hill, they are
built by driving into the ground a double fence of
strong stakes, the inner one twenty or thirty feet in
height, tightly knotted and woven together with
torotoro, a fibrous plant or creeper found in the woods.
Every few feet is carved a hideous head, with a hand
grasping the patu or other weapon and grinning, to
strike terror into the approaching foe. This inner
fence is pierced with holes for muskets, and the only
means of egress is by heavy sliding doors strongly
secured with bars and bolts. The outer fence is not
so strongly made, and unless an enemy broke it down
with hatchets, there is no means of getting in except
by holes at the bottom, where a man might squeeze
through, but he would of course be immediately
dispatched by the besieged. Our soldiers found
much difficulty with these pahs in the war against
the aborigines in New Zealand. Apart from the
introduction of firearms, the native weapons were
the spear for distant attack, and the club and meri for
close quarters. This latter is like a butcher's cleaver,
in the shape of a beaver's tail and made of green talc.
Such weapons were passed from father to son as
family heirlooms, and in later years when the natives
had given up their heathen dresses and customs,
some still persisted in carrying the meri slung as an
ancestral ornament to their girdle.

THE MAORIS AT HOME. 1 49

The Maoris, if not distinguished in the chase, are
mighty eaters. Like all savage men, when suffering
from hunger, they will devour their food ravenously.
At their meals each man has a flax basket containing
his food, which he sits to eat, using the fingers of his
right hand, like the Hindoos, to convey the same to his
mouth. The women sit apart from the men, also the
slaves, and after a huge meal, devoured with rapidity
in perfect silence, calabashes of water are brought in,
of which they drink copiously. Their horrible practice
of cannibalism, for which the Maoris have earned
such a detestable reputation, is confined entirely to the
men ; the women never touch human flesh, and the
warriors only resort to this dreadful act of inhumanity
from motives of revenge, and to strike terror into the
hearts of their enemies.

What the breadfruit tree is in Africa, the edible
fern, Pteris escuknta, is in the land of the INIaoris.
This plant grows ten feet high, and its roots are
dug up in November, cut in pieces nine inches long,
and kept stewed for a year before eaten. As there
are no wild animals in the country, a delicacy which
they greatly enjoy are rats and native dogs ; the
latter is relished as the special dish at banquets and
on festive occasions. No European dog is, however,
eaten. In the first decade of the present century
New Zealand was overrun by rats, but some settler
introduced a Norway rat, which not being accepted
as an article of food itself preyed upon the native
rodents, and finally extirpated them. The Maoris
are fond of caterpillars ; they swallow several sorts
of insects in a living condition, and eat a jelly made
of moss and seaweed with their sweet potato, which
is previously steeped in the sea and dried in the sun.
One of the principal feasts among the Maoris is

ISO

AMONG THE MAORIS.

called the Rakari, when huge wooden scaffolds in
pyramidal form are erected and piled with sweet
potatoes, maize, fern-roots, fish, etc. In some cases

THE RAKAKI, OR STAGE FEAST.

as many as six thousand people have joined in the
feast, and after they have eaten to repletion the
guests carry away whatever they can.

THE MAORIS AT HOME. 151

The musical instruments of the Maoris consist only
of the flute and the trumpet, and with these they
accompany their love songs and martial chants.
Their singing is musical, but none of their songs
are rhymed or have any dramatic character. They
are very fond of proverbs, some of which are worth
quoting.

" We can search every corner of a house, but the
corner of the heart we cannot."

" Passing clouds can be seen, but passing thoughts
cannot."

That no man is a prophet in his own country is
equivalent to their proverb, "A mussel at home, a
parrot abroad."

Their games are nearly all sedentary, like those of
the Hindoos. One is "/cz," played with bright balls
and string ; another, mani, is precisely like the cat's-
cradle of our own childhood. They have also a
game known as " Til' which is similar to our
children's game of "buzz" or "Simon says, Thumbs
up." They are immensely fond of riddles, and while
floating along the rivers in their canoes, during the
evening, they will amuse each other with an unlimited
supply of these, which do not seem to have very
much point.

The funeral rites of the Maoris are very dramatic.
They place the dead in a sitting posture, the brow
is garlanded with flowers, and the whole body is
enveloped in a mat of fine texture. The dead man's
relatives and friends, gathered from a far distance,
seat themselves on the ground, and after sacrificing
certain birds to the gods, spend days in lamenta-
tions and war songs descriptive of the prowess of
the deceased.

CHAPTER XII.

THE WORK IN RECENT TIMES.

" Their daily delight shall be in Thy name ;
They shall as their right Thy righteousness claim ;
Thy righteousness wearing, and cleansed by Thy blood,
Bold shall they appear in the presence of God."

BEFORE proceeding to take a glance at the New
Zealand of to-day, it is only right that a special
tribute be made to the memory of that great
native leader of the Maoris, Tamihana
Wiremu Tarapipi Te Waharoa. No man held such a
distinguished position as he during the terrible war
which practically decided the fate of the Maori nation,
and gave to the British Government one of the finest
and most successful of its colonies.

While on his deathbed, the old king, Potatau, sent a
message to Sir William Martin asking as a friendly
and last request that "he should be kind to the
niggers," meaning by that to enlist the sympathies of
at least one Englishman in the native cause. To his
own people, waiting for his final words of advice and
consolation, he gave the message of heart and dignity,
" Hold fast to love, to law, and to the faith."
152

THE WORK IN RECENT TIMES. 1 53

After his death, the question of succession pro-
voked hostile parties among his subjects. Some were
in favour of having a queen, and his sister, Paea
Potatau seems to have possessed many natural quali-
fications for the post. A few proposed his son,
Matutaera Potatau, but undoubtedly the chosen of
the people would have been Tamihana, as the most
enlightened and honourable of their chiefs. He had
not feared to oppose them in many warlike proposals,
for he was a man of peace, and while an ideal patriot,
saw the futility of pursuing a war indefinitely against
the British arms. But he had no ambition for
kingship, and ended the dispute about succession
by supporting the claims of the dead king's son, a
weak-minded man. Henceforth the nominal sove-
reign sank into insignificance, and Tamihana, better
known by his baptismal name of George Thompson,
became the mediator between the contending armies,
and was a most conspicuous figure in New Zealand
politics. He was a Christian man, and the official
documents which he addressed to the governor and
others are certainly in spirit and principle a model of
Christian statesmanship. For instance, in speaking
to the tribes upon a message which had been received
from His Excellency the Governor, he addressed
them thus : —

" I say, O my friends, that the things of God are
for us all. God did not make night and day for you
only. No, summer and winter are for all ; the rain
and wind, food and life, are for us all. Were those
things indeed made for you only ? I had supposed
that they were for all — if some were dogs and others
were men, it would be right to be angry with the
dogs and wrong to be so with the men. My friends,
do you grudge us a king, as if it were a name greater

154 AMONG THE MAORIS.

than that of God. If it were that God did not permit
it, then it would be right (to object) ; and it would be
given up : but it is not He who forbids, and while it
is only our fellow-men who are angry it will not be
relinquished. If the anger is lest the laws should be
different, it is well ; let me be judged by the Great
Judge, that is, my God — by Him in whom all the
works that we are employed in have their origin. And
now, O friends, leave this king to stand upon his own
place, and let it rest with our Maker as to whether
he shall stand or fall. This is sufficient of this por-
tion of my words, and although they may be wrong,
yet they are openly declared."

Upon this man rested the responsibility of the final
submission of the Maoris, for when he heard of the
murder of the missionary Volkner he determined to
have nothing to do with such atrocities and tendered
his sword to General Carey. After visiting Auckland,
Wellington, and other places, he returned to his own
place and people, and died in the midst of many
friends. '" What shall I do," whispered one of the
chiefs, " and the Maoris, your children, when you are
dead ? " The old man, clear-headed and faithful,
replied : " You must stand by the government and
the law, and if there be any evil in the land, the law
will make it right." He clung to his Bible to the last;
the incantations of the Hau-Hau fanatics he would
not tolerate, and he taught his friends to utter this
prayer constantly, when in his weakness he had to be
carried from place to place : —

" Almighty God, we beseech Thee give strength to
Wiremu Tamihana whilst we remove him from this
place. If it please Thee, restore him again to perfect
strength ; if that is not Thy will, take him, we beseech
Thee, to heaven."

,THE WORK IN RECENT TIMES. 1 55

His last words were : — " Te Whakapono, Te Aroha,
Te Ture" — Christianity, Love, Law. When he had
passed away the Maori chiefs, with their natural
imagination, said : " We are like the morning mist,
which for a while hovers over the earth, and when the
sun arises disappears." So keenly did they feel his
loss.

It remains now only to briefly speak of New
Zealand as it is in our own times. The old names
are retained, but a great change has come over the
face of the country, for few colonies have had such a
rapid and permanent career of progress. With its
magnificent climate, not unlike our own at its best
and without the same changes to which our seasons
subject us. New Zealand has become a fine field for
the emigrant to enter and develop. Roads, railways,
towns, and telegraphs everywhere speak of civilisation
and a go-ahead and prosperous people. Where once
the Maori warrior tramped his way through deep,
ferny solitudes, the busy hum of commerce is heard,
and many an old battlefield is now waving with
golden corn, the site of peaceful homesteads.

A monument of Christian progress, and the won-
derful advance of civilisation, is the beautiful Christ-
church Cathedral with its graceful spire, which tells
of victories won for the Cross.

But the Maoris are rapidly dying out. Slowly but
surely the onward step of civilisation edges them off
the pathway, and without any deliberate attempt to
extinguish a brave, and in many respects a noble,
race, the natives are being supplanted by the English
everywhere. Still, in many positions, degraded as
they may be in others by the touch of European
customs and sins, in many ways they are honourably
surviving. One is in their native clergy, a distinctive

156

AMONG THE MAORIS.

feature of a Church which has now passed from the
missionary into the colonial sphere of action. The
work of native clergy was the grand idea of Bishop
Selwyn. He believed that vast good might be
accomplished by such agency, and two of such
ministers were sent by him to their tribes, but a foe
in ambush shot them both, and thcv died comforting

mmmM-

CHRISTCHURCH CATHEDR.-VL, NEW ZEALAND.

themselves with the word of God in their martyrdom.
It is worthy of note that during the devastating
spread .of the Hau-Hau fanaticism, the ordained
native ministers in every case stood firm, and showed,
as in the history of Madagascar and nearly all the
mission-fields, that the heroes of the Cross are found

THE WORK IN RECENT TIMES. 1 57

in the natives themselves. Several of the deceased
native clergy are mentioned with great respect by the
Bishop of Auckland in the account of the last year
of his colonial bishopric.

He speaks of the Rev. Revata W'inemu Tangata
as having been admitted to orders by Bishop Sehvyn
in 1867, and in his subsequent work as held in high
esteem. " He was a humble-minded man, one of
nature's gentlemen, refined by genuine Christianity,
an earnest preacher, and a self-denying servant of the
Master."

Another, the Rev. Rupene Paerata was " as courage-
ous in the denunciation of evil as his warrior father in
contending with his enemies. He was highly re-
spected and much beloved by the congregation to
which he ministered, and the remembrance of his
Christian life will continue to influence them for
good."

The Rev. Hare Peka Te Tana " was well known to
the settlers of the Bay of Islands, and was held in
great esteem by them as well as by his own people,
with whom his influence was deservedly great." Not
only amongst the clergy, but also the ]\Iaori laity have
conspicuous instances of worthiness been found. The
Bishop, who commends the clergymen above men-
tioned, also speaks highly of a chief Thaka Te Tai
Haknere. " He was a member of the House of
Representatives of the colony, and by his simplicity
of character, his honesty, his independence and sound
good sense had won the respect of his fellow legis-
lators. He was for many years an efficient lay reader
among his own people, and was one of the most
useful lay representatives of the native Church
Boards of which he was a member." The work of
the Church has been wonderfully successful, the see

158 AMONG THE MAORIS.

of New Zealand, which Bishop Selwyn took in
1 84 1, has since developed into seven bishoprics,
and Christchurch Cathedral is only one of the
fine ecclesiastical edifices which adorn tlic towns.
Happily the spirit of fraternity, as is usual in our
colonies, is more marked than in the homeland.
There is no question of establishment to divide the
status of the ministers, clergymen are found officiating
in the nonconformist pulpits, and, although there are
of course some few exceptions, it may be said with
much truth in the streets of New Zealand cities, and
churches, " Behold how good and pleasant it is for
brethren to dwell together in unity." There is a
sturdiness about the Christianity of these Christian
preachers ; they have still to rough it, and those who
think that a minister's life in New Zealand is one of
ease and luxury are soon undeceived. Of course,
there, as here in England, we find as we carry the
Gospel, commerce follows with the spirit keg, and
with the message of peace comes too often the old
enemies of the Cross at home.

But the outlook is bright, and the work goes on.
When Bishop Stuart of Waipu was in London a
few years ago, he gave his impressions of New Zea-
land, which very accurately depict the state of the
colony and the work in these more recent years : —

" In New Zealand, when once Christianity took
root, it spread rapidly. It was almost like a bush
fire. Our settlers go there and cut down the trees
and wait for the dry season, and then try to have a
good * burn ' ; but a great deal depends upon circum-
stances whether they have it or not, and if the wind
does not blow strong enough, or if rain should set in,
the labour of months is lost for a time. In New
Zealand there was that period of preparatory labour ;

THE WORK IN RECENT TIMES. 1 59

there was a cutting-down of the jungle, and then God
sent fire from heaven and there was a conflagration,
and it spread rapidly, so that, when the illustrious
Bishop Selwyn arrived (sent out as he was, partly at
the charge of the Church Missionary Society, to be
the first Bishop of New Zealand), he found — what?
He traversed a country which a few years before had
been the home of the most barbarous and savage race
known ; he traversed it throughout its length and
breadth, and he wrote home : — ' Everywhere I see
the people eager for instruction, meeting for daily
prayers, keeping the Sabbath, learning to read the
portions of God's Word translated into their language
— in short/ he said, ' I seem to see a nation born in a
day.' That was the testimony of Bishop Selwyn,
w^ho, after other men had laboured, came to enter into
their labours ; that was his generous and honourable
testimony in the work he found had been done. The
nominal profession of Christianity was universal
throughout the island at that time. Then came a
change.

" When I first visited New Zealand it was simply a
case of holding on to a desperate cause ; but now
what have I to tell ? A wonderful transformation has
taken place in the period I have mentioned. I have
seen it take place under my own eyes. The number
of native clergy at present labouring in New Zealand
is quite three times what it was when I first visited
the country."

The problem as to the expediency of ordaining
natives to the office and work of the ministry has at
anyrate been solved in New Zealand, and, as we
have seen from the testimony of their Bishop, these
coloured clergy live well and work well.

Fifty years after Marsden's death on the 12th of

l6o AMONG THE MAORIS.

May, 1888, there was a remarkable gathering of these,
when forty-seven Maori ministers solemnly conse-
crated themselves afresh in memory of the Maori's
friend, and, as "baptised for the dead," pledged them-
selves to carry forward his great work.

The whole of the Bible and prayer-book is now
widely circulated in the Maori language ; newspapers
are published in the vernacular ; and the familiar
hymns of our English churches and chapels are
being sung in their own euphonious tongue.

While there is, of course, much to lament over, there
being a " submerged tenth " of even this decayed and
fast diminishing race, over whom shadows have been
flung from the civilisation over the sea ; still there is
ground for gratitude to God. When we think of the
New Zealand of the past, a desert of darkness,
cruelty, and sin, the promise has surely in her borders
been fulfilled :

" Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree,
and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree,
and it shall be to the Lord for a name, for an ever-
lasting sijjn which shall not be cut off"

THE END.

LORIMER AND GILLIES, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH.

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4.23 Among the Maoris

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